
(l;iss"Bi5i_5.5_Q 



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T. "l fonTtariz . 114 S.3^ ■'it . Ptdla 



LIFE-SCENES 



PROM THE 



OLD TESTAMENT. 



WITH MAPS AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 



Rev. GEORGE JONES, M.A., 

Chaplain United States Navy, 
AUTHOR OP *' LIFE-SCENES FROM THE FOUR GOSPELS." 



PHILADELPHIA: 

J. C. GARRIGUES & CO., 

No. 608 ARCH STREET. 

1868. 






^6«' 



Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1868, by 

ilET. GEORGE JONES, M.A., 

In the Clerk's OflBce of the District Court of the United States, for the Eastern 
District of Pennsylvania. 



J* %7 '-VI 



W18T00TT & Thomson, 
Stereotypere, Philada. 



PREFACE. 



Those old times of Abraham and Moses are dimmed by the 
mists of so many centuries, and are connected with such strange 
events, that they are apt to assume a myth-like appearance, and 
we find a difficulty in looking on them as real things. Es- 
pecially has the glamour of our childish fancy in our early 
readings atld hearings of Bible scenes, had an effect to distort 
them into unreal shapes ; and our continuous subsequent read- 
ing has helped in giving permanency to those early impres- 
sions. The Scripture language is also difierent from that of 
other books, and helps to make us treat the subjects as if they 
did not belong to human life. And moreover, those Eastern 
scenes are all so different from ours, that a degree of indefinite- 
ness must of necessity rest upon our apprehensions, unless we 
make an effort which most persons are not willing to under- 
take, in order to a full knowledge and a distinct impression 
respecting these persons and events. 

Yet it is evident that the value of Bible teachings depends 
on our having a clear and full comprehension of what is con- 
tained in its sacred pages. 

The object of the present work is to aid the reader in these 
respects : first, by offering such exhibitions of present Eastern 
tent-life as may help to make him understand the peculiar 
habits, modes of thinking and rules of conduct among those 
ancient dwellers in tents ; secondly, by presenting the Israelite 
patriarchs as they really were, — men with our instincts, and 
reasoning powers, and feelings, — mortals, with our earthly 



4 PREFACE, 

stamp except so far as they were brought into immediate com- 
munings with the Deity ; and yet even in that, never losing 
their human nature and their distinct individualities : thirdly, 
by trying to make the Scripture scenes full, by means of the 
knowledge which libraries and travellers place within our 
reach, and to make them vivid and present to the reader's imag- 
ination, — in short, as far as circumstances will admit, to make 
them stand out as life-scenes before him. 

With regard to the second item in this effort, the writer while 
at his work met with a paper in the London Quarterly of Oct., 
1859, so appropriate and forcible that he takes the liberty of 
making an extract : 

" Here again our aim should be to realize the men as they 
were. We lose instruction, unless we appreciate the human 
element in scriptural characters, while we are careful not to 
forget what is divine in the direction and record of their lives. 
The more we feel them to be men like ourselves, the more we 
learn from their actions and their sufferings. Biographical 
principles ought to be fearlessly applied in the Holy History, 
just as we cannot make ourselves acquainted with the Holy 
Land, except after close geographical inquiry. The haze of 
unreality is in both cases alike undesirable. Nor are the 
religious lessons of the Old Testament in any degree impaired, 
because the men of whom we read were homely in the circum- 
stances of their lives, rude in their civilization, and strangely 
like other men in their motives and conduct. The smallness 
of the life docs not detract from the greatness of the promise, 
but rather enhances our sense of the superintendence which 
conducted every step of their history onward toward its con- 
clusion ; just as the smallness of the land involves no dishonor, 
but invites our attention all the more pointedly to its glorious 
destinies." 



I 



PREFACE. 5 

In filling up those remote Bible scenes, and in his effort to 
make them vivid and life-like to the reader, the author has 
made use of the well-known laws in human feeling and con- 
duct, by which we know that certain things being given, certain 
results will follow : but in doing this, and in letting his imagi- 
nation have that exercise which the case required, he has felt 
also the danger in such use of this faculty and has endeavored 
to keep it within the proper bounds. Anything like making a 
romance out of Scripture incidents is to be entirely deprecated : 
and all attempts at sketching Bible scenes should be in most 
careful subservience to the revelations in the Word of God. 
Josephus has in this respect committed an error, by following 
the Latin historical authors in his day, and putting speeches into 
the mouths of persons introduced in his writings, which he had 
no authority for doing. The writer of the present book has 
carefully avoided everything of that nature, and he has, he 
believes, made all his work in entire reverence for the Scrip- 
tures themselves. He has also avoided the course of some 
excellent biblical scholars, who have shown an unwillingness 
fully to admit miraculous action when the effect might be pro- 
duced by unusual operation of natural causes. The full actu- 
ality of miracles is everywhere acknowledged in this book, with 
an argument also that what we call natural laws are only a 
uniform mode of action by the Deity for men's good, and 
can as easily be departed from by Him when there is sufficient 
cause. 

With such a proper reverence for Scripture, picturing, both 

in Sunday-school and in the pulpit, may be made the vehicle 

of good results. In a notice of a former work of the author, 

by the " Sunday-School Teacher," of Chicago, it is remarked, 

" Picture teaching is always delightful, if at all well managed. 

It is the method for a Sunday-school teacher." To this may be 
1 * 



6 PREFACE, 

added, that there is often no method for impressing a truth 
from the pulpit, and for making it permanent, so effective as to 
attach it to some vividly-sketched Scriptural scene with which 
it is connected. The writer of this has listened to some of the 
best preachers of his day, and although the discourses have 
been powerful and convincing, they have often left no promi- 
nent idea, and nothing enduring except the general effect. In 
other cases, a sketched Bible scene has attached both itself and 
its connected truth, to the mind ; and not only this, but the 
memory has taken continued pleasure in reverting to both. 

It was the intention, when this book was commenced, to 
make it embrace all the most prominent incidents of the Old 
Testament, from Abraham to Daniel, both inclusive ; but the 
author soon discovered that this would be impossible without 
such a degree of compression as would counteract the design 
of the work ; and indeed, he found the parts here introduced so 
extremely rich in facts and so full of the picturesque in inci- 
dent, that his pen, unconsciously to himself, lingered among 
them till he was at last able to go only half-way toward the 
accomplishment of his original purpose. The striking parallel- 
ism between the peculiar Scripture incidents and the idiosyn- 
crasies of the different Pharaohs reigning during the Israelite 
period in Egypt, illustrative of the latter, is deserving of yet 
further attention, and it is hoped that scholars will pursue the 
subject beyond what could be done in the limits of this book. 
The affirmative testimony from the monuments as it is here 
exhibited, drawn from the writings of the two great German 
Egyptologists, is the more valuable because those writers have 
the peculiar German views of Scripture incidents. 

The author cannot withhold here the expression of his grati- 
fication at the success of a former work like the present entitled, 
" Life-scenes from the Four Gospels," and at the testimony of 



PREFACE. 7 

its usefulness given by persons of all classes and from every 
part of the country. After a very careful preparation of the 
present work, he submitted it to the examination of his valued 
young friend, Mr. I. Newton Baker ; and to the critical acumen 
of that gentleman the book is indebted for much of the accuracy 
and neatness in its present appearance. 

George Jones. 

United States Naval Asylum, 
Philadelphia, July ^thy 1868. 



In addition to the notice of authorities in the foot-notes, the following 
titles are given more in detail, — the Bible being always the chief authority : 
Bunsen : '^ Egypt's Place in Universal History," by Christian Karl Josias 

Bunsen, Chevalier, D. Ph. and D. C. L, 
Lejpsius: "Denkmaeler aus Egypten und Aethiopien," etc., 1842-1845, von 

C. E. Lepsius, 13 vols., royal folio. 
Lepsius : *' Chronology of the Egyptians," by Dr. Richard Lepsius. 
Kenrick : "Ancient Egypt," by John Kenrick, M. A. 
Wilkinson : " Manners and Customs of the Ancient Egyptians," by Sir J. 

Gardner Wilkinson, D. C. L., F. E. S. 
Wilkinson : " Topography of Thebes and General view of Egypt," by Sir J. 

Gardner Wilkinson, D. C. L., F. E. S. 
Layard: "Nineveh and its Eemains," by H. A. Layard. 
Hobinson : " Biblical Eesearches in Palestine," Eobinson and Smith. 
Stanley: "Sinai and Palestine," by Arthur Penrhyn Stanley, M. A., Canon 

of Canterbury. 
Stanley : " Lectures on the History of the Jewish Church," by Arthur Pen- 
rhyn Stanley, M. A., Canon of Canterbury. 
Porter : " Five Years in Damascus," by Eev. J. L. Porter, A. M., F. L. S. 
Olin : " Travels in Egypt, Arabia, Petrsea and the Holy Land," by Eev. 

Stephen Olin, D. D. 
Loftus: "Travels and Eesearches in Chaldea and Susiana," by Wm. Kennet 

Loftus, F. G. S. 
Burckhardt: "Travels in Syria and the Holy Land," by John Lewis 

Burckhardt, F. G. S. 



ILLUSTRATIONS. 



PAGB 

1.— TENT OP AN ARAB SHEIKH 26 

2.— MAP OF THE SUPPOSED " UR OF THE CHALDEES." 49 

3.— REMAINS OF THE ANCIENT TEMPLE OF THE MOON-GODDESS HURKI, 

AT MUGEYER 51 

4.— EGYPTIAN MONEY, AS REPRESENTED ON THE MONUMENTS 79 

5.— HIEROGLYPHICS— PTOLEMY'S NAME, ETC 117 

6.— ORIGINAL ALPHABETS; PH(ENICIAN, AND HEBREW COIN LETTER, ETC 121 

7.— GEN. L 1, AND EX. XX. 3, IN THE ORIGINAL HEBREW FORM 124 

8.— HIEROGLYPHIC, HIERATIC AND DEMOTIC INSCRIPTIONS 128 

9.— THE ANCIENT WALL ENCLOSING THE CAVE OF MACHPELAH 136 

10.— TERAPHIM OR HOUSEHOLD GODS 164 

11.— MAP OF PART OF THE NILE AND ITS BRANCHES 187 

12.— EGYPTIAN HEAD-DRESSES IN THE TIME OF JOSEPH 188 

13.— TUTHMOSIS IIL, THOUGHT TO BE THE PHARAOH OF JOSEPH'S TIME.... 199 
14.— HORUS I., THi3 SUPERSTITIOUS PHARAOH. SUPPOSED TO BE THE ONE 

"WHICH KNEW NOT JOSEPH." 247 

15.— SETHOS I., SUPPOSED TO BE THE PHARAOH IN WHOSE TIME MOSES 

WAS BORN 253 

16.— AVENUE IN THE GREAT HALL OF COLUMNS AT KARNAK, THEBES 260 

17.— HEAD-DRESS OP EGYPTIAN CHILDREN AND PRINCES 263 

18.— RAMESSES II., SUPPOSED TO BE THE PHARAOH IN WHOSE TIME MO- 
SES FLED FROM EGYPT 269 

19.— MENEPHTIIAII., THOUGHT TO BE THE PHARAOH OF THE EXODUS 293 

20.— GENERAL MAP, SHOWING THE REGION OF THE JOURNEYINGS OF THE 

ISRAELITES 316 

21.— MAP FROM THE CROSSING OF THE RED SEA TO SINAI 323 

22.— MAP OF MOUNT SERBAL AND ITS VICINITY 346 

23.— MAP OF MOUNT SINAI AND ITS VICINITY 358 

24.— VIEW OF MOUNT SINAI, COPIED FROM A PHOTOGRAPH 359 

25.— PLAN OF THE TABERNACLE AND ITS COURT 381 

26.— MAP OF KADESH-BARNEA, AND PROBABLE SITE OF THE SLAUGHTER 

OF THE ISRAELITES 408 

27.— THE SUMMIT OF MOUNT HOR, SEEN FROM THE SOUTHEAST 439 

28— MAP OF A PORTION OF THE HAURAN, ANCIENTLY BASHAN 465 

29.— HEAD IN ALTO-RELIEVO, BELIEVED TO BE OF ASHTEROTH-KARNAIM, 

RECENTLY DISCOVKUKD IN TIIF. avptknt BASHAN ?. 466 

8 



CONTENTS. 



CHAPTEE I. 

IN SOUTHERN CANAAN. 

PAGB 

Time of these scenes — Beersheba described — Evening gatherings — 
Abraham 17-25 

CHAPTEE II. 

TENT-LIFE IN THE EAST. 

Nomadic life undergoes very little change, and why — Exhibitions of it 
in extracts from the journals of various travellers in the East. The 
bardic songs 26-48 

CHAPTEE III. 

" UR OF THE CHALDEES." 

Placed by the early Arab geographers and the Talmudists near the 
mouth of the Euphrates — The spot recently visited and described — 
Important discoveries there — Temple of moon-goddess built by King 
Ur-uck — Proofs that this was anciently a very sacred place — The 
temples also connected with astronomy — Two other claimants to be 
considered the Ur of Scriptures 48-55 

CHAPTEE IV. 

GOD IN HISTORY. 

Early spread of idolatry and its cause— Necessity for a standing protest 
against it, and a public demonstration of God in government — How 
this to be made — Family at Ur — Call of Abram — Haran — Journey 
to Canaan 55-64 

CHAPTEE V. 

IN CANAAN. 

Sichem — The three families after Noah — People of Canaan noticed — 
Bethel — Journeying thence southward — A drought — Famine — The 
travellers compelled to fly from their new country — "With what 

feelings 65-70 

9 



lO CONTENTS, 

CHAPTER VI. 
IN EGYPT. 

PAGE 

The arrival there — Sarai seized upon and taken to the palace — A great 
blot on Abram's character — Singular episode in Egyptian history — 
The shepherd-kings — Manetho's history of them — Also Hindoo 
account of the Pali-stan — How this explains the difference in the 
treatment of Abraham and of Jacob's family 70-79 

CHAPTER VII. 

IN PALESTINE. 

Abram returns to Canaan — His wealth and Lot's — They are com- 
pelled to separate — Lot's choice of place — The Dead Sea and Vale of 
Siddim — Abram goes to Hebron — Alarm — He pursues Chedorlaomer 
and defeats him — Melchizedek — A formal covenant from heaven vis- 
ibly made.. 79-90 

CHAPTER VIII. 
IN SOUTHERN PALESTINE. 
Trouble in Abram's tent and its cause — Hagar — Ishmael — A child pro- 
mised to Sarai — Her name changed to Sarah : Abram's to Abraham — 
He entertains angels — Cities of the plain destroyed — Abraham goes to 
Gerar — Hisdeception there 91-96 

CHAPTER IX. 
AN HEIR GIVEN. 
Birth of Isaac — ^^Laughter" — Cause of that name — Feast — Offence by 
Ishmael — He and his mother sent off — They are near perishing — 
Beersheba, and its name 9*^-102 

CHAPTER X. 

THE TRIAL OF FAITH. 
Scene at Beersheba — Called to sacrifice Isaac — Human sacrifices preva- 
lent in all those nations : the belief common that what was most 
precious to the person offering was most acceptable to their gods — 
Abraham takes Isaac to Moriah — His hand stayed — A greater sacrifice 
where the offering was made — Abraham now removes to Hebron — 
Death of Sarah — He purchases a burying-place 102-113 

CHAPTER XI. 

HOW ALPHABETS WERE ORIGINALLY MADE. 

Was Abraham's contract for the purchase of Machpelah in writing? — 
Progress of the human mind in forming a written language — Egyp- 
tian hieroglyphics mostly represent sounds — The Hieratic writing — 
Papyrus — An alphabet — Invented by the Phoenicians — Our own alpha- 
bet a set of sounds from pictures, as in Egyptian hieroglyphics — 
The Demotic writing — The Rosetta Stone — Key to the hieroglyphics 
discovered 114-128 



CONTENTS. II 

CHAPTER XII. 
WIFE FOR ISAAC. 

PAGB 

Abraham's loneliness — News from Haran — Abraham despatches a ser- 
vant thither to procure a wife for Isaac — Events on his arrival there 
— Eebekah chosen — She goes with him to Beersheba 128-132 

CHAPTER XIII. 

DEATH OP ABRAHAM. 

Table of his descendants — His death — His title, Friend of God, is his 
best eulogium — The burying-place — Its present condition 132-138 

CHAPTER XIV. 
Isaac's family. 

What his tent presented — Esau and Jacob — Esau sells his birth-right — 
A famine — Isaac retires to Gerar — He lies respecting his wife — Re- 
proved by Abimelech — He goes to Beersheba — Esau takes wives — 
Discomfort in the tents at home 138-144 

CHAPTER XV. 

THE STOLEN BLESSING. 
Isaac wishes to give Esau the blessing of the first-born — Eebekah con- 
trives a plan for procuring it for Jacob, and succeeds — Esau threatens 
to put his brother to death — Jacob sent to Haran — Ishmael in 
Arabia , 145-153 

CHAPTER XVI. 
JACOB IN EXILE. 

Jacob's excuses for his conduct — How we are to view him — The dream 
at Bethel — His reception at Haran — Serves for Rachel — Deceived — 
His family — All steal away from Laban — Are pursued and overtaken 
— The scene and results 153-167 

CHAPTER XVII. 

THE CRITICAL MEETING. 
Anxiety about meeting Esau — Messengers sent to this brother — Their 
report — Consequent alarm — Jacob's prayer — Presents to Esau sent 
forward — The night-struggle with the angel — The meeting with 
Esau , 168-173 

CHAPTER XVIII. 
JACOB IN CANAAN. 
Jacob crosses the Jordan to Shechem — Bloody revenge on the people 
by his sons — He goes to Bethel— Thence toward Hebron — Death of 
Rachel — Joseph hated by his brethren — They conspire to kill him, but 
Bell him t.o the Ishmaelites — Jacob believes him to be dead 173-183 



12 CONTENTS. 

CHAPTEE XIX. 
EGYPT. 

PAGE 

Effect of this recent scene on Joseph — His journey — The Pharaoh of 
his time — The position of these kings — Joseph is purchased by Poti- 
phar and his head shaved — Religion of the Egyptians 183-191 

CHAPTEE X^J. 

BEFORE THE KING. 

Joseph's advancement by Potiphar — Then imprisoned on false charges 
— His condition there — Dreams by Pharaoh's officers in prison, and 
interpretation — Then dreams by Pharaoh — They are interpreted by 
Joseph — Results to him — His exaltation — A wife given — Description 
of On 191-206 

CHAPTEE XXI. 

THE NILE LIFE.? OR DEATH.? 

How Joseph's interpretation was received — The Nile valley — The river : 
its origin : its floods — Horrors from a failure — Abdallatif s account of 
the famine of A.D. 1199 206-213 

CHAPTEE XXII. 

ABUNDANCE — FAMINE. 

Anxiety about the Nile-flood — The rise — The abundance — Store-houses 
filled— The famine 213-218 

CHAPTEE XXIII. 

MEETING WITH THE BROTHERS. 

The famine general — Joseph's brothers come to buy grain — The meet- 
ing — His suspicions about Benjamin — Simeon is kept as a pledge for 
his being producetl : the others dismissed , 218-223 

CHAPTEE XXIV. 

THE FULL RECOGNITION. 

Benjamin taken to Egypt — Joseph preserves his incognito till he can 
be assured of Benjamin's identity— His plan to obtain this assurance 
— Makes himself known — Pharaoh's invitation for removal of the 
whole family to Egypt 224-232 

CHAPTEE XXV. 

JACOB IN EGYPT. 

The remoVal to Egypt— Meeting between Joseph and his father— Jacob 
bcf'T.. i>},.,ivw.]| — iw.-.h-c .llncss and death— Joseph's death 233-246 



CONTENTS, 13 

CHAPTEK XXVI. 
FROM JOSEPH TO MOSES. 

fAGB 

Brevity in the Scripture history of this period — Do the Egyptian monu- 
ments give us any elucidation ? — Horus I. — His character — Sethos I. — 
Order from the sovereign to put the Hebrew male children to death — 
Moses born — Architectural embellishments by Sethos 1 246-262 

CHAPTEE XXVII. 

MO-USES — " SAVED FROM WATER." 

His education — Science among the Egyptians — Accession of Ramesses 
II. — His character and acts — Condition of the Israelites during his 
reign — Moses feels his own false position in the palace — He slays an 
Egyptian and flees 262-271 

CHAPTER XXVIII. 

MOSES IN MIDIAN. 

His feelings during the flight and in Arabia — A well, and watering 
flocks — Is taken to the tent of Jethro — Marries a daughter of this 
sheikh — Peninsula of Sinai — Mental discipline of Moses in this 
retreat 271-279 

CHAPTER XXIX. 

WHO AND WHAT WAS THE PHARAOH OF THE EXODUS .f* 

Menephthah succeeds Ramesses II. — His character peculiar — It may 
have helped to shape events at the Exodus — Elucidations respecting 
him from the monuments — From Egyptian history — What Strabo 
\ about the Exodus and Moses r 280-285 

CHAPTER XXX. 

THE MISSION TO DELIVER. 

Moses in Arabia : with his family : in the tribe : the evening gathering 
— Did he there write the book of Job? — The burning bush — The com- 
mission to deliver his countrymen — His hesitation and scruples — 
Meets Aaron — The two go together to Egypt — Meet the elders of the 
Israelites 285-291 

CHAPTER XXXI. 

THE DEMAND FOR FREEDOM MADE. 

How difi'erent Moses now from what he had formerly been before 
the monarch — The demand, and the reception given it — The plagues 
on Egypt — Miracles in the Bible — What is a miracle? — The subject 
discussed — Have we not miracles now in the history of nations, only 

not revealed as such? 292-308 

2 



14 CONTENTS, 

CHAPTEK XXXII. 

THE EXODUS. 

PAGE 

Feeling among the Israelites — Preparations for flight — The Passover 
feast instituted— The first-born slain— The exodus— Pillar of cloud: 
then of fire — First day's journey : second : third, and the Ked Sea — 
The dilemma — The Egyptians in pursuit 309-322 

CHAPTEE XXXIII. 

THE CRISIS. THE DELIVERANCE. 

Night comes to both parties — The Israelites cross the sea — The Egyp- 
tians, pursuing them, are drowned — Song of Moses — Then of Miriam 
— Where was the place of crossing? 322-328 

CHAPTEK XXXIV. 

THE ADVANCE. 
Landscape as the Israelites now looked around — They advance south- 
wardly — Three days without water — Then bitter water — Their further 
journey — Threatenings of famine — Distress — Quails sent — Then 
manna 329-342 

CHAPTEK XXXV. 

TOWARD SINAI. 
They proccv^d — The verdure and beauty of Wady Feiran — Is the ad- 
joining Mount Serbal the Sinai of Scripture? — Bartlett's visit to 
Serbal 343-351 

CHAPTEK XXXVI. 

REPIIIDIM A BATTLE. 

The advance — Rephidim and murmurings — Water given miraculously 
— Attack by the Amalekites, who are discomfited — Jethro arrives in 
the camp — His advice to Moses^ 351-356 

CHAPTER XXXVII. 
SINAI. 
Description of the mountain — Its position — Its summits — Dr. Robin- 
son's account — Rev. Dr. Olin's ascent at its front — A thunder-storm 
there described 356-367 

CHAPTER XXXVIII. 

THE DECALOGUE. 

The encampment formed at Sinai — Moses called to ascend the mountain 
— The thunders and liglitning and cloud — He is charged to prepare 
the people for some solemn event — Moses and Aaron summoned to 
the summit — The Decalogue given — Alarm among the people 367-372 



CONTENTS. 15 

CHAPTEK XXXIX. 

AT SINAI. 

PAaE 
While Moses is on the mount the people fall into idolatry — The pun- 
ishment for it — Necessity for a system less spiritualized — Call for 
contributions for a Tabernacle 372-380 

CHAPTER XL. 

THE TABERNACLE. 
Description of it — The cloud descends and envelops it — A calamity on 
Aaron's family — The Priesthood — Dress of High Priest — A blas- 
phemer stoned — The laws finished — Questions why the doctrine of 
the soul's immortality was not noticed by Moses 380-392 

CHAPTER XLI. 

THE MOVEMENT FROM SINAI. 

Order of movement and of encampment — ;Complaints among the peo- 
ple — Fire sent among them — Murmurings for animal food — Quails 
sent and a plague — Jealousy on the part of Aaron and Miriam — Lep- 
rosy inflicted on the latter 392-400 

CHAPTER XLII. 

KADESH-BARNEA SPIES SENT OUT. 

Description of the Desert et-Tih — Kadesh-barnea — Spies sent into Ca- 
naan — Anxiety of the people..' 400-407 

CHAPTER XLIII. 

A MUTINY AND CARNAGE. 

The spies return and make report — The alarm — The mutiny — God's 
special presence in the Tabernacle — The doom — Their despair and 
insane act — The attack — The carnage among the Israelites 407-419 

CHAPTER XLIV. 

THE DOOMED HOST. 

The sadness of this history — What it might have been — Rebellion 
of Korah, Dathan and Abiram — Their punishment — Murmurings of 
the people — They are visited by a plague — Life in the wilderness — 
All over twenty years find graves there 419-430 

CHAPTER XLV. 

MOSES AND AARON DOOMED. 

We again get on the track of the Israelites — They come again to Kadesh 
— No water — The outcry — Moses and Aaron directed to strike the rock 
with their rods — Their transgression and the doom — Message to Edom 
— A passage through refused — The hosts turn toward the south.... 430-438 



1 6 CONTENTS. 

CHAPTEE XLVI. 
Aaron's death. 

PAGE 

Mount Hor : its position and appearance — Aaron and Moses and Eleazar 
by divine command ascend to its summit — Aaron dies there — The 
Israelites proceed southwardly—Complaints about the manna — Fiery 
serpents sent among them — A brazen serpent elevated for their 
healing 439-444 

CHAPTER XLVII. 

TOWARD THE END. 

They pass east of Edom — Anxieties of Moses — The Moabites and Am- 
monites — The Amorites conquered 444-450 

CHAPTER XLVIII. 

A VERY SINGULAR COUNTRY. 

The Hauran — Its stone houses and deserted cities — Recent travels there 
— The Lejah — Proof now before us of God's miraculous interference 
for the Israelites — Why he interfered — The worship in Bashan.... 451-466 

CHAPTER XLIX. 

BALAAM. 

Position now of the Israelites — Balaam sent for by the Moabites, etc. — 
His attempts at cursing counteracted — His plot then to corrupt the 
Israelites — The result — The punishment 466-478 

CHAPTER L. 

DEATH OF MOSES. 

His prayer to be permitted to cross the Jordan — The refusal — The firm- 
ness of determination in all God's dealings with these people — Seen 
also in Christ's words to the world — Moses divides the lands east of 
the Jordan — His address — His hymn — Gives up the leadership to 
Joshua — His blessing to each tribe — His end 478-484 

CHAPTER LI. 

JORDAN CROSSED 

Mourning for Moses— Spies sent across the river — Their report — De- 
Bcription of the river — It was in full flood — Preparations for crossing 
— The ark borne to the river— The water miraculously held back — 
The crossing — Moses seen inner .fiorw.rH 485-491 



Life-Scenes 



CHAPTER I. 
IN SOUTHERN CANAAN, 

WE desire to carry the reader to a period dating back 
about thirty-eight hundred years. This seems to be 
a long time^ but length of time depends on the measure- 
ments which we apply to it. A day is sometimes long in 
the life of an individual, or a year may be short in the same 
life : a century is but a fragment in the life of a nation : the 
age of our world, as geologists estimate it, is beyond the 
power of the imagination to grasp ; and yet, compared with 
eternity, what is it ? The mind cannot conceive of its infi- 
nite shortness of duration, in such a comparison. 

This present book is to treat of acts and purposes in the 
government of God, before whom all other vastness shrinks 
into insignificance, and time itself is scarcely an item of cal- 
culation ; for with him one day is " as a thousand years, and 
a thousand years as one day.'^ He was, at the period now 
spoken of, about to bring into decisive operation a series of 
events designed to reach, with infinite results, to our day, 
and through eternity. 

About thirty-eight hundred years ago, an aged man stood 
before his tent in an Eastern country, at eventide, and 
looked abroad over a scene adapted to bring feelings of 
very great satisfaction to his heart. For he was the chief 

2* 17 



1 8 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

of a pastoral tribe, and the plain on which he stood was 
covered with his flocks and herds, now coming home to be 
watered, after having fed through the day upon the rich 
adjoining pastures. A calm and very beautiful picture it 
was — there was such a significance of comfort and enjoyment 
around ; and the mellowness of evening was now on every 
object, and also in every heart. For, while eventide has its 
charms everywhere, they are peculiarly great in that Eastern 
region, and in such open space, where the sun, as it ap- 
proaches the horizon, lights up all nature with its own 
greatness of splendor, not dazzling or scorching, but in its 
mild glory enriching and beautifying every object, and turn- 
ing the air itself into a glowing, ruby light. 

But in this picture, the aged chief himself formed the 
most striking and interesting object, as he stood there erect, 
active still, though more than one hundred and twenty years 
old, and with a face in which authority and dignity were 
blended with greatest gentleness and kindness. He was 
looked up to with revei?ence by all, and he deserved their 
reverence. In those times men were strong in very advanced 
age ; for the human constitution had not yet been weakened 
by indulgences continued from generation to generation and 
by the hereditary vexations of the world ; and in addition 
to this, the nomadic life is adapted to bring into activity the 
healthier influences on body and mind. People in such 
employment have a feeling of suflbcation in cities, and can 
breathe freely only in the tent or under the open sky, and 
their health has the hardy, vigorous cast which such cir- 
cumstances must i)roduce: they walk erect in the desert 
with an clastic stej), and a sense of openness and freedom 
which tinctures all their lives. Travellers to the East pic- 
ture to us the Arab sheikh as a very model of dignity with- 
out stiffness, and of polished urbanity without a conscious- 
ness of its own action ; and even the children of his house- 
hold soon catch the manners of their seniors in both these 



i 



IN SOUTHERN CANAAN 19 

respects. The person at whom we are now looking, before 
the tent in Southern Canaan, was the progenitor of many 
nations, and, among them, of all the Arab tribes ; and wc 
may well picture him as having these admirable character- 
istics of the Arab sheikh. 

The country amid which his tent now stood had no great 
beauty, except that which is dearest to a pastoral people, 
namely, a large extent for grazing purposes and a sufficiency 
of water, without danger of intrusive neighbors coming to 
meddle with their herds. It was a region of gentle undu- 
lations, showing only in the far distant north anything that 
could be called the outlines of mountains ; and on the east 
and west some lower ranges just sufficient to give variety to 
the landscape ; while, toward the south, the eye wandered 
over an unbroken, level extent of grass-covered land, with 
scarcely a shrub to break its uniformity. But the spectator 
knew that, in this last direction, there would soon succeed 
a dreary, barren waste, extending on for more than a hun- 
dred miles. That barrenness kept this tribe of nomads free 
from neighbors in that direction, as did also similar barren- 
ness, though to a less degree, on the east. Therefore it was 
a somewhat isolated region, and in very many respects all 
the more valuable on that account. A broad, shallow de- 
pression in the ground (now called Wady^ es 8eba), coming 
down from the northward and eastward, and passing off 
thence westwardly, gave to this region a transit for its waters 
to the Mediterranean in the season of rains, but in summer 
it was dry. On its sides, at the spot we are speaking of, 
wells had been dug, which, from a circumstance to be no- 
ticed hereafter, gave to the place the name of Beersheba, the 
Well of the Oath. 



^ The word wady is one so significant and convenient that it will often 
be employed in this book. It means any depression in the ground sufficient 
to form a water-course when one is needed, and may mean, as here, a shal- 
low, wide depression, or also a valley, or even glen. 



20 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

This region, to a traveller coming from the desert south 
of it, breaks upon the eye with a charming eflPect, especially 
in the spring season, when it is usually covered over with 
flowers of brilliant dyes springing up among the rich herb- 
age; the whole landscape being the more striking from con- 
trast with the barrenness and the dreariness of nature among 
which he has been so long time journeying. That very ac- 
curate observer. Dr. Robinson, describes his approach to 
Beersheba in a manner which will give us a very good idea 
of the place and of the approach to it from the south. He 
had been travelling for many days over the desert, where the 
only variety to its monotonous wastes was an occasional mi- 
rage, taunting the travellers with the appearance of lakes and 
herbage which disappeared as they advanced. At length, 
on April 10th, they came to some shrubs and vegetation in 
a basin where a thin, meagre grass was springing up in 
various places. ^^ Such spots as these," he remarks, " we 
had not seen or heard of since passing Wady Ghurundel on 
the Gulf of Suez." As they now advanced, the country 
around became gradually more open, with broad valleys 
separated by low, swelling hills. Grass increased in the 
valleys, and herbs were sprinkled over the hills. "We 
heard this morning, for the first time, the songs of many 
birds, and among them the lark." Of their journey on the 
11th he says: "Our path now led over a hill and down 
another small valley running nearly E.N.E. toward a wide 
and open country, which spread itself out on every side 
with swelling hills, but no mountains as far as the eye can 
reach. Herbs were abundant, but the scanty grass was 
withered and parched" [the season was unusually dry]. 
Proceeding, " we halted at a fine well, surrounded with sev- 
eral drinking troughs of stone for watering camels and flocks. 
The well is circular, eight or ten feet in diameter, and twenty- 
seven to the surface of the water." licaving this, "our path 
led for a time over sandy hills sprinkled with herbs and 



IN SOUTHERN CANAAN 21 

shrubs, but with little grass.'^ " As we advanced [April 
12th] the loose sand ceased, and the country exhibited more 
grass mingled with herbs. Our road thus far had been 
among swelling hills of moderate height. We now began 
to ascend others, higher but of the same general character. 
The herbs of the desert began to disappear, and the hills 
were thickly covered with grass, now dry and parched. The 
ascent was long and gradual. We reached the top at a 
quarter past one, and looked out before us over a broad, 
level tract, beyond which our eyes were greeted with the 
first sight of the mountains of Judah, south of Hebron, 
which skirted the open country and bounded the horizon in 
the east and northeast. We felt that the desert was at an 
end. Descending gradually, we came at two o'clock upon 
an open, undulating country ; the shrubs ceased, or nearly 
so ; green grass was seen along the lesser water-courses, and 
almost green sward, while the gentle hills, covered in ordi- 
nary seasons with grass and green pastures, were now burnt 
over with drought. Arabs were pasturing their cattle in 
various parts, but no trace of dwellings was to be seen. At 
a quarter to three o'clock we reached Wady es Seba, a wide 
water-course or bed of a torrent running here W.S.W. to- 
ward Wady es Suny. Upon its northern side, close upon 
the bank, are two deep wells, still called Bir-es-8eba, the 
ancient Beersheba. We had entered the borders of Pales- 
tine! 

" The wells are some distance apart ; are circular, and 
stoned up very neatly with solid masonry, apparently much 
more ancient than the wells at Abdeh [just passed]. The 
larger one is twelve and a half feet in diameter, and forty-four 
and a half to the surface of the water, sixteen of which at the 
bottom are excavated in the solid rock. The other well lies 
fifty-five rods W. S. W., and is fifteen feet in diameter and 
forty-two feet deep. The water in both is pure and sweet, 
and in great abundance ; the finest indeed we had seen since 



22 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

leaving Sinai. Both wells are surrounded with drinking 
troughs of stone for camels and flocks. The curbstones 
were deeply worn by the attrition of ropes.'^ 

Van de Velde saw this region in a more favorable season, 
and he wrote, " Nothing has so much surprised me as the 
lovely herbage with which this extensive, undulating, sandy 
plain is clothed [April 1st]. Sand is not now to be seen at 

all ; all is grass and flowers At 9 A. M. we reached 

the wells of Beersheba. They are five in number, narrow at 
the opening, and deep. They form, as it were, a group of 
wells in a shallow dry bed of a stream.^^ 

On an evening such as we have described, in those ancient 
times, the aged chief of the tribe then occupying this 
region gazed over this scene of plain and hill, where his 
numerous retainers were bringing in the herds to the wells 
for refreshment and for the protecting night-shelter at home. 
There was an outspoken joyousness in these attendants ; for, 
as we shall soon observe, the nomads have their own peculiar 
times of mirth, have their songs and their poets gifted with 
the power of impromptu effusions, their musical instruments 
and performers, their treasures of unwritten history and 
genealogies, their thrilling stories of present adventure or of 
love, and their peculiar sensibilities to love itself; — all which, 
as they come in from their solitary, scattered employments 
through the day, make a double enjoyment in these evening 
gatherings at the tents, or in the congregated movements 
incident to their changes of camping-place. So this evening, 
as they came from far and near, the shouts of herdsmen and 
their song, the sounds of musical pipes and laughter and 
gaiety, the lowing of herds and the bleating of flocks, all 
mingled in a pleasant harmony and suited well the scene, 
where nature in its sky, now changing to amethystine hues, 
and its sun tipping all objects with a mild glory, and its 
welcomings to approaching rest, seemed itself to have a 
gentle, quiet joy. 



IN SOUTHERN CANAAN 23 

But the merriment among these thickening groups had a 
somewhat subdued, although not on that account a less 
pleasing, cast, when they saw the figure of their chief; and, 
if in some it was quite hushed, it gave way to a more pleas- 
urable, because more affectionate, sentiment. For all loved 
the aged patriarch. His character was indeed a very pecu- 
liar one, and well adapted to produce great respect and 
affection, and also a feeling deepening into veneration. 
They knew him to be brave and skilful in battle; for, 
although mostly a man of peace and quiet, even to the sac- 
rifice of his own interests, he had on one occasion armed 
them and led them to war for the relief of friends and 
neighbors carried off for slavery, and had defeated the 
enemy superior in numbers and put them to flight ; and he 
had afterward refused any requital to himself. His hospitality 
was always free and large, and his tribe felt that they were 
honored by it. He was manly, simple, affectionate in dis- 
position, and had a religious sentiment pervading his feel- 
ings and actions in a very remarkable degree. This latter, 
indeed, was so strong a characteristic, that his adherents 
would have looked upon him with awe approaching to fear, 
if there had not been with it a gentleness and manliness 
which drew all to him, and blended with their reverential 
regard a feeling also of deep affection and attachment. 

His history, as communicated to them, was a peculiar one. 
He was from a distant region, and, they were told, had come 
hither by divine command. He was also said now to have 
communications with the Deity, whether by voice or dreams 
is not known ; but he believed in them, so far as to make 
them the rule of his life. For this reason he had come from 
his own country, and he was called now " The Hebrew,^^^ 
perhaps from Heher, " to cross over,^^ in consequence of his 



1 Gen. xiv. 13. In the Septuagint, this passage reads Abram -nephrns, 
*^Abram who came over." 



24 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

having come from beyond the great river, the Euphrates. 
So he was an exotic in his present residence ; and his belief 
in the truth of the divine command was shown by his plant- 
ing himself here among strangers, led as he said by that 
Superior Will made manifest to him. People listened and 
wondered ; and even the idolatrous rulers of the country, 
with whom he came in contact, impressed by his sincerity 
of belief and by his strong points of character, treated him 
with great respect. 

On this evening, however, while the vast, busy life invited 
on every side the chiefs gratified regard, these were yet 
constantly attracted from the moving panorama toward his 
son, — we might ahnost say his only son, for another one, 
older, had been banished from his home. And this son, 
standing now near the tent, was one who might well engross 
a father's attention and love. The young man — for although 
twenty-five years old,^ he was in those days considered almost 
a youth — had in himself no very strong traits of character, 
certainly nothing corresponding to the greatness of the 
father ; but a mysterious greatness connected with the super- 
natural belonged to him and his future ; and the father's 
eye, while seemingly resting on the youth, saw through him, 
far onward in time, a wonderful glory, compared with which 
all this brilliant radiance now filling the evening air was 
but the veriest dimness itself. 

The father of whom we have been speaking was the patri- 
arch Abraham ; and the son was Isaac. An older son, Ish- 
macl, was a wanderer, sent off from home in consequence of 
female jealousy within the tent by which the old man was 
standing. The spectacle which we have just been contem- 
l)lating — the father and Isaac — is one which we may very 
well stop to gaze at, and before which all other objects in 
that landscape lose their comparative interest. Was Abraham 



* On authority of Josephus, Antiq. I. 13 J 2. 



IN SOUTHERN CANAAN, 25 

led by Jehovah^s direct hand ? was he brought from the 
Euphrates actually by the divine voice ? was he now, some- 
how or other, in direct communication with Jehovah ? Did 
a glory of that kind shine through Isaac ? Were all these 
things dreams, fancies, things of a heated imagination in 
the father, and told falsely about the son? and were they all 
to fade away with the individuals themselves ? 

Nay, we cannot believe it. For we in our day, so dis- 
tant from theirs, have only to look at the Jewish people 
among us and at our own religious institutions, to see the 
demonstrations before our eyes — facts tangible by our out- 
ward senses — of an amazing power of some kind or other then 
concentrated on those two individuals, and of which they 
were to be the medium for centuries to come, if not for eter- 
nity itself. The strongest unbeliever must acknowledge this 
much ; the believer feels and knows the influence of that 
power in himself. What histories of the world, facts, strange, 
great, life-giving, death-giving facts and histories, have come 
from those two individuals, whom we have just been con- 
templating on that plain of Beersheba ! 

Therefore what can be known and told of them, and of 
things consequent on them, must be the greatest of all his- 
tories. So it actually is, as told in the Bible. So it should 
be to us. 

We are now trying, here, to clothe that long past with 
fullness, and to give it, as far as may be, the freshness and 
vividness of the present. We look at that scene, the two 
men in front, the wife of Abraham sitting by the tent-open- 
ing, and probably gazing also at the son ; and we will make 
them, for a while, the central point in our first efforts at 
resuscitating those long-buried things. 



26 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 



CHAPTER II. 
TENT-LIFE IN THE EAST 




Tent of an Arab Sheikh. 
{Copied from Layard.) 



A LARGE portion of the scenes to be brought forward 
in this book will be connected with nomads, people 
moving about with flocks, and whose life is in tents. It is 
a very peculiar life, and the incidents to be introduced are 
tinged by those peculiarities. Consequently it will be well 
to study that mode of living ; and while we shall find the 
materials for such study to be ample, the subject will also 
have the charm of novelty, so different are the scenes it 
presents from those to which we are accustomed in our own 
condition of society. 

The nomadic life at the present day appears not to differ 
from what it was in the very ancient times. Travellers 
through such countries tell us that, in what they see, they 
are continually ciirried back to the days of the patriarchs; 
and the scenes which they depict seem indeed to be often 
only a transcript of what comes before us incidentally in 



TENT- LIFE IN THE EAST, 27 

the Bible. From the present we are able to learn therefore, 
without difficulty, respecting the past; and the tent-life to 
be now presented to the reader may probably be considered 
as photographing to us pretty accurately the tent-life of 
thirty-eight hundred years ago. 

Indeed, in such a condition of society there can be little 
motive and little room for change. Each tribe of people 
stands by itself, isolated and sufficient in itself. Wants are 
very few in number ; life is as simple as possible, and from 
the necessities of the case can never be complicated. What 
reason is there for change ? Indeed, there can be no change 
where every one is compelled at the outset to reduce his 
necessities to the smallest possible amount, and has so to 
keep them, and where any multiplication of wants must 
only be a multiplication of constant embarrassments. The 
whole household must be such as to be easily moved, and the 
removals are so frequent that only the simplest items of 
domestic use can be retained. All is simple, plain, to our 
eyes often meagre ; and yet there is, with this simplicity of 
life among these people, a stateliness of manner as well as 
courtesy, and often a dignity, which command our respect 
as well as win our admiration to a degree which no luxuri- 
ous appliances of gorgeous palaces could do. 

There is in the nomad a sense of unbounded freedom 
which gives its impress to all his bearing and to every feeling 
and thought. Mr. Porter, author of " Five Years in Da- 
mascus,^^ says, '' It is only within the bounds of his own 
undisputed domain that the Bedawy ^ can be seen to advan- 
tage. In a city he is like a caged bird. His countenance is 
uneasy and restless, his gait constrained, and his whole mien 
betrays anxiety. When not engaged in business, he gen- 
erally squats in some quiet corner of a khan or street, peer- 

1 Bedawy y singular ; plural Bedamn. This is the more correct way of 
spelling these words (instead of Bedouin and Bedouins), and will be used 
in the original matter in this book. 



28 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

ing from beneath the ample folds of his kefiyeh^ at the 
busy crowd around him. But he is a different being when 
he breathes the desert air ; his eye dilates, his spare, Aviry 
frame becomes erect and commanding, and his step is firm 
and free/^ That writer had engaged for an intended visit 
to Palmyra, the protection of ^Amer, the sheikh of the great 
Bedawy tribe of the ^Anezy, whose pasture-grounds were in 
that direction, and he thus describes him : " He was a man 
of middle stature and seemingly of middle age. His frame 
was spare but wiry. There was no evidence of strength, 
but there w^as evidence of capability to endure great fatigue. 
His eye was quick, with more of shrewdness than fierce- 
ness in its glance. The whole expression of his counte- 
nance was mild and soft, and in this respect different from 
that of the generality of his race.^^ A part of the journey, 
just after they had reached the desert, is thus described : 
" With silent footfall and sweeping step and ship-like mo- 
tion, our dromedaries sped onward. There was no path to 
follow, and no barrier reared by nature or human hand to 
retard or turn them aside. Their course was direct and 
regular as if guided by compass. Often did I scan the 
country around in the vain endeavor to descry some solitary 
wanderer, or even some animal, on this dreary waste. None 
could be seen. About the hour of afternoon prayers, 'Amer, 
who had for some time ridden in silence with Mohammed 
the Ageily behind him, pulled off his heavy boots and Arab 
cloak and thrust them into his capacious saddle-bags. Thus 
disencumbered, he leaped lightly from the dromedary and 

* Keftyeh is a handkerchief, usually of brilliant colors, doubled and 
thrown over the head, ho that the long points fall down on each side of the 
face. Usually it is kept in its place by a fillet of wool around the head. 

The abeih is a square-shaped cloak, generally made of goat's hair or fine 
wool, but sonu'tinies of the richest silk, interwoven with gold and silver, 
and embroidered on the shoulders. It is universally worn by the Bedawin, 
and very generally by the inhabitants of villages bordering on the desert. 
Many of the desert tribes have a peculiar pattern for the cloth. See Porter. 



TENT'LIFE IN THE EAST. 29 

ran at a quick pace to an eminence a little on the right. He 
now looked a new man ; the transformation was truly won- 
derful. In the city he appeared like one over whose head 
near sixty summers had passed, leaving their impress in 
form and face. But now, in the desert, his form was erect 
and his step elastic, and his eye bright as a youth of twenty. 
His picturesque costume, too, added to the juvenile appear- 
ance. His brilliant silk robe of alternate stripes of red and 
white descended in graceful folds to the middle of his leg ; 
it was confined at the waist by a girdle of red morocco 
leather, round the front of which were little brass tubes for 
cartridges. The sleeves of the robe were wide and open to 
the elbow, and from beneath them hung down those of his 
shirt, long and pennon-like, so that as he walked the points 
swept the ground. His silk kefiyeh was of the most bril- 
liant colors, and had a fringe of plaited cord more than a 
foot in depth. His finely-formed feet and limbs were naked. 
Such was 'Amer as he now lightly and joyfully trod the 
desert soil ; and such is the ordinary undress of the Bedawy 
sheikhs. Those however, who are of the ruling family in 
a tribe, wear over this a short cloak of scarlet cloth, faced 
and trimmed with black.'^ 

Some further extracts will be interesting, as showing the 
resemblances between the present and the very ancient tent- 
life of the East. Having proceeded for several hours, they 
saw at a great distance some specks on the landscape, which 
gradually developed themselves ; and, 

" At four o'clock we were in the midst of great herds of 
camels scattered over plain and mountain for many miles on 
every side, and soon after, overtopping an eminence, we saw 
before us black tents almost innumerable. We met an Arab 
wandering among the flocks ; but he passed close to us with- 
out a salutation, and almost without a look at us. Some 
time after another passed near us, to whom 'Amer addressed 
a single question, receiving a brief answer. I gave him the 
3* 



30 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

usual salutation of strangers in the desert [el-awdfy, ^safety, 
or peace, from God') ; he started as if surprised, gave me a 
quick, fierce look, but deigned no reply. This seemed no 
very pleasant introduction to Arab life. It took me quite 
by surprise ; it was so different from the polite salutations 
of the peasantry, and from my anticipations of the boasted 
hospitality of the Bedawin. I began to have some gloomy 
forebodings that all might not be right. I did not then 
know, what I afterward learned, that this is Arab etiquette 
— in fact, the very essence of politeness. When strange 
Arabs approach an encampment in the desert they wrap 
their cloaks carefully around them, and almost completely 
conceal their faces in the ample folds of their kefiyehs. No 
word of salutation is addressed to them, and no question 
asked on either side. They guide their animals in silence 
to any tent they choose to select, being careful, however, not 
to pass close to any other, as it would be considered an in- 
sult not to claim the hospitality of the first ; they dismount 
without a word at the tent-door, and from that moment be- 
come the guests and proteges of its owner. The reasons and 
wisdom of this rather singular custom become at once appa- 
rent from a consideration of Arab life. Blood feuds are of 
frequent occurrence among desert tribes, and there are few 
families but are somewhere involved in them. When a 
stranger approaches an encampment, therefore, he knows 
not but that he may meet an enemy, and he consequently 
conceals his features till he reaches a place of safety. The 
duties of hospitality, too, arc held so sacred, that no tribe or 
individual will salute or question an unknown stranger who 
claims it, lest they should discover in him one with M^hom 
they may have a blood feud. Once the stranger is within 
the precincts of a tent, his host is not only bound to supply 
his wants, but to defend him with his life. 

" We dismounted at tlu^ door of a spacious tent in the 
centre of the encampment. No sooner had our sheikh 



TENT' LIFE IN THE EAST 3 1 

touched the ground than he was affectionately embraced by 
his son, a fine boy of about fifteen. This scene at once 
brought to my mind some incidents recorded in Scripture, 
and seemed, in fact, to realize the interesting narratives of 
patriarchal times. The youth placed his hands on his 
father's neck, and kissed each cheek, and then they leaned 
their heads for a few seconds, while embracing, on each 
other's shoulders. Precisely similar was the scene at the 
meeting of Jacob and Esau, nearly four thousand years ago : 
^ And Esau ran to meet him, and embraced him, and fell on 
his neck and kissed him.' We were soon surrounded by a 
little group of wild-looking Arabs, who manifested intense 
curiosity at our every movement. Our luggage was placed 
within the tent, and comfortable seats prepared by the hands 
of 'Amer himself, who now cordially welcomed us to his 
desert home. The whole scene and circumstances were to 
us intensely interesting. The numerous tents grouped to- 
gether on the parched desert soil, the widespreading flocks 
and herds browsing peacefully on every side, and the pic- 
turesque and primitive costumes of those who tended or 
wandered forth among them, pictured vividly before our 
minds the days when Abraham dwelt in tents and Jacob 
led his family and flocks across this same desert to the land 
of promise. The tents are unquestionably the same as those 
used in the most remote ages, for nothing can be imagined 
more simple than their construction. An oblong piece of 
black goat's-hair cloth is fastened to the ground by ropes 
and stakes at each end and along one side ; several poles, 
some seven or eight feet long, placed upon their ends, keep 
it at the proper elevation, and leave one side entirely open — 
such is the whole fabric. The Bedawin never call it a tent; 
its invariable name with them is house of hair. 

^' ' Amer having borrowed my knife, went to a neighboring 
tent occupied by his harSm and younger children, to make 
ready, as we afterward found, the feast for his guests. A 



32 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

lamb was speedily brought by a young man from the flock, 
and slain at the tent-door, and the still quivering limbs were 
handed over to his wife to be got ready 

^*At a signal from the other tent great bustle and activity 
was manifested by the group before us. All rose up, and 
elderly men, approaching from various quarters, saluted us 
respectfully. ^Amer, his son, and Mohammed appeared 
among them, and were soon followed by three Arabs bear- 
ing between them a monstrous dish, nearly four feet in 
diameter, on which was a large pile of rice, with the mem- 
bers of a sheep scattered round the sides, and a large crater- 
like cavity in the summit filled with melted butter. This 
was placed as near us as the fire would permit, and resem- 
bled, when on the ground, a volcano in miniature. We 
were invited to approach and commence the banquet ; and 
several elders of the tribe, with Mohammed, after much 
pressing, were persuaded to sit down with us. Our host sat 
at a respectful distance ; his son and two or three smaller 
children close beside him. It is Arab etiquette for the host 
to be served last of all 

"When we had withdrawn with those who had joined us, 
another relay sat down ; and these were followed by another, 
until the mountain became a valley of dry bones. It was 
only when all had eaten and were satisfied, that ^Amer and 
his son approached and gathered up the fragments. Poor 
fellows ! their fare was but scanty 

"As the evening advanced the circle of our visitors en- 
larged. The fitful blaze but half revealed the wild figures 
that squatted round, and dimly showed the beautifully 
formed heads and soft eyes of two or three mares that gazed 
fluniliarly on the assembly, and the faint outline of the huge 
camels picketed in the background. We were entertained 
with wild tales of Arab life and warfare, of bold forays and 
fierce reprisals, and of the wondrous speed and endurance 
of matchless and priceless mares, whose unbroken genealo- 



TENT-LIFE IN THE EAST 33 

gies and untold perfections the whole tribe were proud of. 
We were eagerly questioned too about our own far distant 
land 

"A bed on the hard, stony, desert soil tends to promote 
early rising; and for once at least I was thankful for it. 
The whole encampment, extending far away on every side, 
as viewed in the gray morning light, was one vast forest of 
camels with a dense underwood of sheep and goats. Pres- 
ently they began to waver, and the whole was soon in mo- 
tion. The smaller animals assembled in groups, obedient to 
the call of their masters, and then followed them far away 
in the distance. Thus disappeared flock after flock, each 
knowing and following its own shepherd. Occasionally the 
vast masses mingled, and for a few moments united ; but 
this caused no confusion, for ^a stranger will they not follow: 
they know not the voice of a stranger.^ The Arab maids, 
in their graceful flowing robes, each a model for a statuary, 
now went forth from their tents to milk the sheep and 
camels, and returned again with the foam-crowned pails 
upon their heads. It was a purely pastoral and truly patri- 
archal scene, and well repaid us for our early start." 

Their way then led them by other pasture-grounds and 
encampments, where it was difiicult to avoid the Arab hos- 
pitality, and on the following day, 

"At 1.45, as we were passing a large tent in the out- 
skirts of an encampment, a friendly voice suddenly cried, 
^ Ya ^Amer ! Ya ^Amer ! Hauwel ! Hauwel !' (^ O Amer, O 
Amer, stop ! stop !') and in a moment more our chief was in 
the arms of an aged Arab, who embraced and kissed him 
most lovingly. Another and another came up and went 
through the same ceremony. It was quite impossible to resist 
the importunities of these hospitable men. We must dis- 
mount, sheep must be slain, princely banquets must be pre- 
pared in honor of the arrival of ^Amer and the illustrious 
strangers. Our dromedaries were seized and pulled to the 



34 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

ground, and we were all but dragged from their backs and 
transported per force into the interior of the tent. Long 
and loud did we remonstrate. We had expected to reach 
Pahiiyra in the evening, and this besides was no pleasant 
place for us to spend the afternoon. It was in vain, however, 
and so, when we could do nothing else, we quietly sat down 
on our carpets to await the will of our masters. 

" We were scarcely seated when we observed a young man 
bind on his sandals, and set off at speed across the plain. 
In half an hour he returned bearing a lamb on his shoul- 
ders. The poor animal was soon stretched upon the ground, 
bleeding and in the agonies of death. Stripped of its skin 
with Arab despatch, the yet quivering body was handed 
over to the tenants of the harSm. 

" The whole of this scene, however inconvenient under 
present circumstances, was regarded by both Mr. Robson 
and myself with deep interest. It seemed as if we had 
been carried back more than three thousand years in the 
workVs history, and by some mysterious providence per- 
mitted to mingle with the people of patriarchal times. The 
salutations we heard around us and those addressed to our- 
selves were such as had been familiar to us from childhood 
in the stories of Abraham and the angels on the plains of 
Mamre, and of Jacob and Laban at Padan-Aram. Here 
was the aged sheikh sitting in his tent-door watching for 
chance wayfarers; here was the generous hospitality that 
would constrain us to remain until we partook of refresh- 
ments; here too were the widespreading flocks from which 
the lamb was brought, and the almost inconceivable expe- 
dition with which it was killed and served up with butter 
and milk} The solemn interview between Abraham and 



^ The Arab butter is made in the usual way, by churning the milk. 
The process of churning is somewhat singular. A skin of milk is tied up 
to a tent-pole and shaken by a woman until the butter separates. When 
fresh^ the butter is tolerable ; but when it has stood some time, the taste, 



TENT-LIFE IN THE EAST. 35 

the angels was now pictured on our minds in far more bril- 
liant colors than it had ever been before. [See Gen. xviii. 
1-8.] 

" I have often heard it said that the Arab women are 
generally plain in features. I cannot by any means agree 
with this statement. I have now seen many of them in 
different places, and in general I have found their features 
regular, and even handsome. Their bodies are finely pro- 
portioned, and their carriage and walk graceful and easy. 
All of them have that rich, black, lustrous eye that is only 
seen in perfection in the East. The forehead is open and 
high, and the eyebrows beautifully arched. The mouth is 
well formed, with proudly curved lines ; but this feature is 
universally disfigured by the custom of staining the under 
lip dark blue. The braided hair is almost quite covered by 
a black veil that hangs gracefully over the shoulders, the 
corner of which is frequently brought forward to cover the 
lower part of the face. The whole dress consists of a long, 
loose blue robe of coarse calico. It is drawn closely round 
the throat, has wide hanging sleeves, and sweeps the ground 
like a train when they walk. A profusion of bracelets of 
gold or silver adorn the arms, and large rings and drops 
hang from the ears ; but only a few of them wear the nose- 
jewel. This simple costume is admirably adapted to display 
the symmetry of their form and gracefulness of their move- 
ments ; it causes no restraint or stiffness, but allowing full 
play to nature, leaves all the beautiful proportions of the 
body to be fully developed. The gay votaries of fashion in 
the more polished nations of the West might imitate to some 



and even the smell of the skin, comes out rather strong. Milk is of two 
kinds: fresh, called halib ; and curdled, called leben. The latter is a com- 
mon kind of refreshment. It is evidently the nXDn hemah which Abra- 
ham gave to the angels, and which Jael gave to Sisera (Judges v. 25). 



36 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT, 

extent, and with great advantage, the simple attire of these 
daughters of the desert/^ 

To these examples of Arab hospitality may be properly 
added another experienced by Mr. Porter in a visit to that 
most interesting region lying to the southward from Damas- 
cus — the Hauran, the Bashan of early times. He was now 
among the Druzes, who live in the ancient stone houses of 
that country, but yet take many of their characteristics from 
the dwellers in tents. In his journey he came to Hit,^ on 
arriving at which they were taken immediately to the house 
of Sheikh Ass'ad ^ Amer ; and he says, ' 

" Next to bravery in battle, to be reckoned hospitable is 
the proudest distinction an Arab chief can obtain. A plen- 
tiful repast of honey, di&s,^ butter and various kinds of 
sweetmeats was served up soon after our entrance, and at 
sunset a feast was prepared for us which far surpassed any- 
thing of the kind I had before seen. A whole sheep, roasted 
and stuffed with rice, graced the centre; beside it was a huge 
dish of pillaUy^ some three feet in diameter. Round these 
were ranged nearly twenty other dishes of various kinds of 
dainties, including fowls, soups, kibbeh, hurghvl and a host 
of others. Round these again were ranged the thin cakes 
of bread in little piles, on the top of each of which was placed 
a wooden spoon, the only instrument used in this primitive 
land in taking food, and even this is a recent importation. 
All the dishes were of copper tinned, and they were placed 
on a large circular mat in the middle of the floor. The 
guests squatted round the dainties, each one stretching for- 
ward hand or spoon and helping himself to whatever he pre- 
ferred. We were first invited to dine, and having finished, 
the other guests with the servants advanced. Then a por- 
tion was set aside on a separate mat for the sheikh ; and 

* See map in Chapter xlviii. 

^ Wine lK)il€Ml down to a jelly-like consistency. 

' Rice, with .i l:ike of butter on iU centre. 



TENT'LIFE IN THE EAST. 37 

members of his household, retainers, and such of the vil- 
lagers as were present, afterward fell on the remainder. 
Before this third relay the pyramid of rice soon disappeared ; 
the bones of sheep and fowls were stripped of every vestige 
of flesh ; and the soup, burghul and pillau were thrown into 
one huge dish and speedily devoured. 

" But enough of a Druze feast. Even so much I would 
not have inflicted on my reader but that it serves to show 
'the primitive state of society in this country, and that in this 
ancient kingdom of Bashan the lapse of three thousand 
years has effected but little change in manners and customs. 
The hospitality of former days still remains ; strangers could 
not then pass the house or tent of the patriarch without 
being constrained to go in and take food ; and so it is even 
now. The wonderful expedition in the preparation of food, 
when the lamb or kid or fatted calf was brought and killed, 
and the bread was kneeded and baked, and the dainties thus 
hastily prepared were set before the stranger, — all this is 
illustrated here, at the present time, and in the ordinary in- 
cidents of every-day life. It seemed to me, as I wandered 
among these hills of Bashan, as if time had retrograded 
many long centuries. The strange stories I used to read in 
boyhood beside a mother^s knee, in that ponderous old Bible, 
were now realized. These surely are the tents of Abraham ; 
or these are the dwellings of Israel. These are the very 
salutations with which the patriarchs were wont to address 
strangers ; and these the prayers for their safety and welfare 
when they took their departure. At whatever house we 
lodged, a sheep or a lamb was killed for us and fresh bread 
baked. It was sometimes near sunset when we reached the 
house ; but in due time the dainties appeared. To whatever 
village we went among the Druzes, pressing invitations were 
given to stay and eat. Once and again has one seized my 
horse's bridle and said, ' Will not my lord descend while his 
servants prepare a little food.' In one village our interces- 

4 



3S LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

sion saved a lamb which we saw hurried away to slaughter 
just as we entered the street, before even a word had been 
spoken. The chief had seen us approaching, and ^ he made 
haste to kill the lamb ;' fortunately we were in time to save 
it by assuring its hospitable master that we could not remain. 
At another village, where we took refuge from a passing 
shower, we observed the flour taken and water poured upon 
it to prepare unleavened cakes, and it was with difficulty 
that we could prevent the work from being prosecuted.^^ 

The great traveller, Burckhardt, who had prepared him- 
self for journeying among the Arabs by getting a practical 
knowledge of their language and by identifying himself 
with them till he could no longer be distinguished from a 
native Bedawy, and toward whom, owing to his poverty in 
a[)pearance, there would be no possible motive except hos- 
pitality to a stranger, says of one of his stopping-places in 
the Sinai peninsula : " The Arabs had a long and fierce dis- 
pute among themselves to decide who should have the honor 
of furnishing us with a supper and a breakfast the next 
morning. He who first sees a stranger from afar, and ex- 
claims * There comes my guest,^ has the right of entertain- 
ing him, whatever tent he may alight at. A lamb was 
killed for me, which was an act of great hospitality, for 

these Bedouins were poor A Bedouin will praise the 

guest who dej)arts from him without making any other re- 
muneration than that of bestowing a blessing upon them 
and their encampment, much more than him who thinks to 
redeem all obligation by ])aynient.'' 

But very strangely combined with this is a habit of im- 
portunate begging, not, however, seemingly, through any 
fondness for i)ossession, for after receiving, the Arab will the 
next moment give the object as freely away. Layard says 
of Mohammed Emin, sheikh of the Jebours, "a comj)lete 
patriarch of his tribe :'' 

" During our intercourse I liad every reason to be satisfied 



TENT- LIFE IN THE EAST 39 

with his hospitality and the cordial aid he afforded me. 
His chief fault was a habit of begging for everything. Al- 
ways willing to give, he was equally ready to receive. In 
this respect, however, all Arabs are alike, and when the 
habit is understood, it is no longer a source of inconvenience, 
as on a refusal no offence is taken.^^ He adds of him, 
'' All he takes he divides among his friends, and he gladly 
risks his life to get that which is spent in an hour. An 
Arab will beg for a whole day for a shirt or a kerchief, and 
five minutes after he has obtained it he will give it to the 
first person who may happen to admire it.^^ 

Simple as children in these as well as in many other re- 
spects, theirs is still the very poetry of life, and their disposi- 
tion has also very much of this character of poetry. Layard 
was travelling over the plains by the Euphrates with Sut- 
tum, an Arab sheikh, who as their horses dashed gaily along 
amid interminable beds of flowers, exclaimed in his excite- 
ment, " What kef (delight) has God given us equal to this ? 
It is the only thing worth living for. Ya, Beg ! what do 
dwellers in cities know of true happiness ? They have 
never seen grass or flowers. May God have pity on them V^ 
But that poetry of life had even to Suttum its counterpart 
of dark and gloomy prose ; and this was in his own tent and 
connected with his household. His wife " Rathaiyah,^^ says 
Layard, " was a sister of Suttum Meekh, chief of the pow- 
erful tribe of Abde, one of the principal divisions of the 
Shammar. Although no longer young, she still retained 
much of her early beauty. There was more than the usual 
Bedouin fire in her large, black eyes, and her hair fell in 
many ringlets on her shoulders. Her temper was haughty 
and imperious, and she evidently had more sway over Sut- 
tum than he liked to acknowledge, or was quite consistent 
with his character as a warrior. He had married her from 
motives of policy, as cementing a useful alliance with a 
powerful tribe. She appears to have soon carried matters 



40 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT, 

with a high hand, for poor Suttum had been compelled, 
almost immediately after his marriage, to send back a young 
and beautiful wife to her father's tent/' 

It was not wonderful that the sheikh should rejoice in 
that wild freedom out of his tent ; but for a man even more 
sobered down than he was by domestic troubles, there was 
truly an exhilaration in that sea of flowers spreading on 
every side. ^^ During our stay at Arban,''^ says Layard, ^^the 
color of these great plains was undergoing a continual 
change. After being for some days of a golden yellow, a 
new family of flowers would spring up, and it would turn 
almost in a night to a bright scarlet, which would again 
suddenly give way to the deepest blue. Then the meadows 
would be mottled with various hues, or would put on an 
enamelled green of the most luxuriant pastures. The glow- 
ing descriptions I had frequently received from the Bedouins 
of the beauty and fertility of the banks of the Khabour 
were more than realized.'' 

Respecting a tribe on the move by the Sinjar wells, 
he says, ** The narrow valleys and ravines were blood-red 
with gigantic poppies. The Bedouins adorned their camels 
and horses with the scarlet flowers and twisted them into 
their own head-dresses and long garments. Even the Ti- 
yari dressed themselves up in the gaudy trappings of nature; 
and as we journeyed, chanting the Arab war-song, we resem- 
bled the return of a festive procession from some sacrifice of 
old. During our weary marches under the burning sun it 
required some such episode to keep up the drooping spirits 
of the men who toiled on foot by our side. Poetry and 
flowers are the wine and spirits of the Arab ; a couplet is 



1 Arl)an is on the Kliaboiir a tributary to the Euphrates; is the place to 
which the Israelites were carried, and where they *' hung their harps upon 
the willows." It is about ninety miles S. E. from Haran, where Abraham 
Btopped for a while, and where Jacob procured his two wives. 



TENT'LIFE IN THE EAST. 41 

equal to a bottle, and a rose to a dram, without the evil 
effects of either. 

" The middle of March in Mesopotolnia is the highest 
epoch of spring. Flowers of every hue enamelled the 
meadows, not thinly scattered over the grass as in Northern 
climes, but in such thick and gathering clusters that the 
whole plain seemed a patchwork of many colors 

"Although such scenes as these may be described, the ex- 
hilaration caused by the air of the desert in spring, and the 
feeling of freedom arising from the contemplation of its 
boundless expanse, must have been experienced before it can 
be understood. The stranger as well as the Arab feels the 
intoxication of the senses which they produce 

Subsequently, "It was one of those calm and pleasant 
evenings which in spring make a paradise of the desert. 
The breeze bland and perfumed by the odor of flowers came 
calmly over the plain. As the sun went down, countless 
camels and sheep wandered to the tents, and the melancholy 
call of the herdsmen rose above the bleating of the flocks.^^ 

We continue extracts in order to give the reader an idea 
of this singular kind of life in all its aspects. 

" Their [shammar] sheikhas dress differed but in the qual- 
ity of the material from those of his followers. A thick ker- 
chief, striped with red, yellow and blue, and fringed with 
long plaited cords, was thrown over his head and fell down 
his shoulders. It was held in its place, above the brow, by 
a band of spun cameFs wool, tied at intervals by silken 
threads of many colors. A long white shirt, descending to 
the ankles, and a black and white cloak over it, completed 
his attire. He led Rassam^ and myself to the top of the 
tent, where we seated ourselves on well-worn carpets. When 
all the party had found places, the words of welcome which 
had been exchanged before we dismounted, were repeated. 



1 British Vice-consul at Mosul, opposite the site of Nineveh. 

4* 



|2 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

* Peace be with you, O Beg ! upon my head you are wel- 
come ; my house is your house/ exclaimed the sheikh, ad- 
dressing the stranger nearest to him. ^ Peace be with you, 
O Soffuk ! may God protect you,^ was the answer, and sim- 
ilar compliments were made to every guest and every person 
present/' 

Mrs. Rassam, their companion on this occasion, was con- 
ducted to the tent of the females of Soffuk's household, and 
of them we are informed, that, 

" Of the three ladies now forming his har^m, the chief 
was Amsha, a lady celebrated in the song of every Arab of 
the desert for her beauty and noble blood. She vvas daugh- 
ter of Hassan, sheikh of the Tai, a tribe tracing its origin 
from remotest antiquity, and one of whose chiefs, Hatem, is a 

hero of Eastern romance From her rank and beauty 

she has earned the title of ^ Queen of the desert.' Her form, 
traceable through the thin shirt she wore like other Arab 
women, was well-proportioned and graceful. She was tall 
in stature and fair in complexion. Her features were reg- 
ular and her eyes dark and brilliant. She had undoubtedly 
claims to more than ordinary beauty ; to the Arabs she was 
perfection, for all the resources of their art had been ex- 
hausted to complete what nature had begun 

" Her menage combined, if old song be true, the domestic 
and the queenly, and was carried on with a nice appreciation 
of economy. The immense sheet of black goat-hair canvas 
which formed the tent was supported by twelve or fourteen 
stout poles, and was completely open on one side. Being 
entirely set apart for the women, it had no partitions, as in 
a tent of a common Arab, who is obliged to reserve a corner 
for the reception of guests. Between the centre poles were 
placed, upright and close to one another, large camel and 
goat-hair sacks, filled with rice, corn, barley, coffee and 
other household stuff, their mouths being, of course, upper- 
most. Upon these were spread carpets and cushions, on 



TENT-LIFE IN THE EAST. 43 

which Amsha reclined. Around her, squatted on the 
ground, were some fifty handmaidens tending the wide 
caldron, baking bread in an iron plate heated over the 
ashes, or shaking between them a skin suspended between 
three stakes and filled with milk, to be thus churned into 
butter. It is the privilege of the head-wife to prepare in 
her tent the dinners of the sheikhas guests. The fires, 
lighted on all sides, sent forth a cloud of smoke which 
hung heavily under the folds of the tent, and would long 
before have dimmed any eyes less bright than those of Am- 
sha. As supplies were asked for by the women, she lifted 
a corner of her carpet and untied the mouths of the sacks 
and distributed their contents. To show her authority and 
rank, she poured continually upon her attendants a torrent 
of abuse, and honored them with epithets of which I may 
be excused attempting to give a translation; her vocabulary 
equalling if not excelling in richness that of the highly edu- 
cated lady of the city. The combination of the domestic 
and the authoritative was thus complete. 

" Amsha, as I have observed, shared the affections, though 
not the tent, of Soifuk — for each establishment had a tent 
of its own — with two other ladies; Antonia, an Arab not 
much inferior to her rival in personal appearance; and Fer- 
rah, originally a Yezidi slave, who had no pretensions to 
beauty. Amsha, however, always maintained her sway, and 
the others could not sit, without her leave, in her presence. 
To her alone were confided the keys of the larder — suppos- 
ing Soflfuk to have had either keys or larder — and there was 
no appeal from her authority on all subjects of domestic 
economy.^^ 

On another page of Layard^s book we have before us a 
sheikh who may answer well to the picture in our minds of 
the Hebrew, Abraham. He says : 

'' In the afternoon [when near the Sinjar hills] Suttum's 
father, Rishwan, came to us, accompanied by several sheikhs 



44 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

of the Boraij. He rode on a white deloul [female drome- 
dary] celebrated for her beauty and swiftness. His saddle 
and the neck of the animal were profusely adorned with 
woollen tassels of many colors, glass beads and small shells 
after the manner of the Arabs of the Nejo. The well-trained 
dromedary having knelt at the door of my tent, the old man 
alighted, and throwing his arms around my neck, kissed 
me on both shoulders. He was tall and of noble carriage. 
His beard was white with age, but his form was still erect 
and his footstep firm. Rishwan was one of the bravest war- 
riors of the Shammar [his tribe]. He had come, when a 
child, with his father from the original seat of the tribe in 

Northern Arabia He was a noble specimen of the true 

Bedouin, both in character and appearance. With the skill 
and daring of the Arab warrior, he united the hospitality, 
generosity and good faith of the hero of Arab romance. He 
spoke the rich dialect of the desert tongue with the eloquence 
peculiar to his race.'^ 

We quote from the journal a few days after this. " The 
Bedouin can tell at once, when drawing near to an encamp- 
ment, the tent of the sheikh. It is generally distinguished 
by its size, and frequently by the spears standing in the 
front of it. If the stranger be not coming directly toward 
it, and wishes to be a guest of the chief, he goes out of his 
way that, on approaching, he may ride at once to it without 
])assing any other, as it is considered uncourteous and almost 
an insult to go by a man's tent without stopping and eating 
his bread. The owner of a tent has even a right to claim 
any one as his guest who passes in front of it on entering an 
encampment 

" As we seated ourselves [at Rishwan's tent] two sheep 
were slain before us for a feast; a ceremony it would not 
have l)een considered sufficiently hospitable to perform pre- 
vious to our arrival, tus it might have been doubtful whether 
the :iniinnl> liiid Ixcn slnin wholly for US." 



TENT-LIFE IN THE EAST 45 

We close with some notices of the manner in which this 
poetry of life produces its effect on the dwellers in tents. 
Layard says : 

" Amongst the Bedouins who watched our camels was one 
Saoud^ a poet of renown among the tribes. With the ex- 
ception of a few ballads that he had formerly composed in 
honor of Soffuk and other celebrated Shammar sheikhs, he 
chiefly recited extemporary stanzas on passing events, or on 
persons who were present. He would sit in my tent of an 
evening and sing his verses in a wild though plaintive strain, 
to the great delight of the assembled guests, and particularly 
of Migwell [another Sheikh], who, like a true Bedouin, was 
easily affected by poetry, especially with such as might touch 
his own passion for the unknown lady [whom he was woo- 
ing]. He would sway his body to and fro, keeping time 
with the measure, sobbing aloud as the poet sang the death 
of his companions in war, breaking out into loud laughter 
when the burden of the ditty was a satire upon his friends, 
making extraordinary noises and grimaces to show his 
feelings, more like a drunken man than a sober Bedouin. 
But when the bard improvised an amatory ditty, the young 
chief^s excitement was almost beyond control. The other 
Bedouins were scarcely less affected by these rude measures, 
which had the same effect on the wild tribes of the Per- 
sian mountains. Such verse, chanted by their self-taught 
poets, or by the girls of their encampment, would drive war- 
riors to the combat fearless of death, or prove an ample 
reward on their return from the dangers of the ghazon [raid] 
or the fight. The excitement they produce exceeds that of 
the grape.^^ 

A similar scene connected with bardic song is described 
by Mr. Thos. W. Atkinson, who travelled among the 
Kirghis' pastoral tribes on the high plateaus of Central Asia, 
and shows how uniform is the effect of that mode of life. 
He says : 



46 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

" After proceeding more than an hour, I beheld a large 
aoul [encampment] three or four miles off, and toward it I 
turned. Two Kirghis presently met me and led me to their 
chief, whom we found sitting at the door of his yourt^ like 
a patriarch surrounded by his family, having in front his 
poet singing the great deeds of his race. He rose to receive 
me, gave me a seat on his own carpet, and then the bard 
continued his song. 

" This family group, the glowing sky and the vast plain 
with the thousands of animals scattered over it, formed a 
charming picture. Homer was never listened to with more 
attention than was this shepherd poet, while singing the 
traditions of the ancestors of the tribe. Whatever power 
the old Greek possessed over the minds of his audience was 
equalled by that of the bard before me. When he had sung 
of the mountain scenes around, the pastoral habits of the 
people, their flocks and herds, the faces of his hearers were 
calm and they sat unmoved. But when he began to recite 
the warlike deeds of their race, their eyes flashed with de- 
light; as he proceeded, they were worked up in a passion, 
and some of them grasped their battle-axes and sprang to 
their feet in a state of frenzy. Then followed a mournful 
strain, telling of the death of a chief, when all excitement 
ceased, and every one listened with deep attention. Such 
was the sway this unlettered bard had over the minds of his 
wild comrades."^ 

To this may be added, from another traveller, a well-out- 
lined sketch of a modern sheikh near Warka, the very re- 
gion from which Abraham originally came. " Sheikh Fa- 
had (the Tiger) was a tall, stout, handsome man, forty-five 
or fifty years of age, with regular features, and the slightly 
aquiline nose so peculiar to the high-class Arab. His fore- 

» Movable house made with wattles and skins and cloth. 
'^ Travels in the Regions of the Upper and Lower Amour, by Thos. W. 
Atkinson, F. R. G. S., F. G. S. 



TENT' LIFE IN THE EAST, 47 

head was lofty and expansive, full of thought and energy. 
The expressive black eyes, as they glanced from one to 
another of the party, beamed with kindness and good-hu- 
mor ; but it was not difficult to conceive them assuming a 
very different aspect on other occasions. Conscious of his 
importance, high birth and dignity, he bestowed his salaams 
with the grace and pride of a monarch."^ 

We give one more extract, in order to show how carefully 
the unwritten genealogical records are preserved in those 
countries. It is from Lady Duff* Gordon^s " Letters from 
Egypt,^^ 1863. She was writing at this time from near 
Thebes : 

'' It was more biblical than ever ; the people were all rela- 
tions of Mustafa's, and to see Seedee Omar, the head of the 
household and a young man, come in from the field, and the 
flocks and herds and camels and asses, is all like a beautiful 
dream. All these people are of good blood, and a sort of 
^ roll of battle' is kept for the genealogies of the noble 
Arabs who came in with Amer, the first Arab conqueror 
and lieutenant of Omar. Not one of these brown men, who 
do not own a second shirt, would give his brown daughter 
to the greatest Turkish pasha.'' 

These extracts are long, but not too long if they enable 
us to bring before our minds more fully and vividly the 
sheikh-life of Abraham and Isaac and Jacob, and Esau, and 
also the tent-life of Moses, and subsequently of the whole 
Hebrew race during the forty years of the wanderings in 
the desert. Amid circumstances like these, people must 
have a cast of character peculiar to themselves. In settled 
communities there is a close pressure of society upon each 
of its members, holding them to laws of honesty and vera- 
city, and general integrity of conduct, which can be more 



1 Travels and Researches in Chaldea and Susiana^ by Wm. Kennet Loftiis, 
F. G. S. 



48 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT, 

easily escaped from where every individual is more of an 
atom disunited from others ; but, at the same time, the plot- 
tings and cabals in close congregations of people, the cor- 
ruptions from luxury and the disguises and frauds incident 
to crowded societies, are not known in the simple habits be- 
longing to a pastoral life. A bounding sense of freedom is 
cultivated in the latter, which keeps man up to the proper 
dignity of his nature. We see also in these extracts how 
the bardic spirit was cultivated and had many admirers, and 
how it broke in upon the seeming monotony of tent-life. 
We can imagine how, in the evenings, the listeners gathered 
around the improvisatores in the tents at Beersheba, or at 
Shechem, or the wanderings in the desert, or far subse- 
quently at the Khabour ; and how thus, when inspiration 
came upon prophets and others, it so readily and uniformly 
took the poetic form. 



CHAPTER III. 
''UR OF THE CHALDEES:' 

FAR down the Euphrates, and near the spot where the 
Tigris joins that stream, is a region to which the curios- 
ity of scholars had been directed though earnestly yet un- 
availingly for a great many years; but which has recently 
been laid open to us through the enterprise of two successive 
English travellers. It was known that the Talmudists and 
the early Arabians designated this spot as the birth-place of 
Abnihani, and that a city there situated was called Ur by 
the learned Arab geographers. 

The region is one that might well have tempted curiosity, 
apart from such religious interest; for although it is now but 
a sandy waste, with only a few specks of green where the 



''UR OF THE CHALDEES: 



49 



marshes connected with the two rivers cause some fertility, 
it is sprinkled over with lofty and very extensive mounds 
formed by ruined edifices, and history intimates that cities 
had riben and flourished there long before Babylon was 
known. The region had the attraction of mystery, and was 
connected with the earliest religions of the world. We are 
now also aware that these cities were deemed so sacred in the 

47-'* E. 




Map of the Supposed Ur of the Chaldees. 
1, Mugeyer. 2, Sinkara. 3, Warka. 4, Tel Ede. 5, Niffar. 6, Shat-el-ffie. 

ancient times as to be each a great necropolis even for coun- 
tries far 'distant. The extensive explorations at Nineveh 
and those at Babylon have not disclosed a single place of 
interment there; the dead of an immense extent of country 

5 



50 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT, 

seem to have been all floated down the Euphrates and Tigris 
for interment in the sacred soil of Ur of the Chaldees. 

The country is inhabited by half-savage tribes of fanatical 
people, always at war with each other, and so hostile to 
strangers that, in connection with the marshes and the diffi- 
culties of subsisting in such a place, explorations had been 
prevented. But in 1840 Mr. W. Kennet Loftus, F. G. S., 
geologist on the staff of Col. Williams appointed on a joint 
commission from England, Russia, and the Shah of Persia 
for the settlement of boundary lines, was able to go there 
under the protection of the Turkish and Persian govern- 
ments. His course was by Niffar (see No. 5 in map), and 
thus on to Mugeyer, the latter of which is six miles south- 
ward from the Euphrates. This region is now one hundred 
and twenty-five miles from the Persian Gulf, but there is 
reason to suppose that it was, in its populous times, much 
nearer, and perhaps bordered quite upon the gulf. 

All these immense mounds, standing there in the great 
wastes of utter solitude, are interesting; but that of Mugeyer 
is found to be especially so from having the only existing 
remains of a Chaldean temple not buried under rubbish, and 
also from written records which that temple has preserved 
for our reading. Mugeyer, meaning " The mother of bitu- 
men,^' is a name. given to the spot by the present natives on 
account of the quantities of that substance used alone, or 
sometimes with reeds, to give cohesion to the bricks, either 
burnt or sun-dried, of which the structures are composed. 
The ruins at this place consist of a low series of mounds, 
and extend from north to south a distance of more than half 
a mile; but the name is given by the natives especially to a 
structure one hundred and ninety-eight feet long by one 
hundred and thirty-three in width, and about seventy feet 
high, the whole elevation being still further increased by a 
wider platform or substructure thirty feet in height. This 
building is in two distinct, massive stories, the lower one 



''UR OF THE CHALDEES:' 



51 



strengthened by buttresses ; the natives say that on the up- 
per story was formerly an additional edifice, which is indeed 
attested by rubbish there five feet in height, showing proba- 
bly where was the temple of their goddess. 




Remains of the Ancient Temple of the Moon-goddess Hurki, at Mugeyer. 
{From a drawing by Mr. Taylor.) 

The success of Mr. Loftus in this visit induced Mr. Tay- 
lor, British consul at Busrah, to venture on other explora- 
tions there in 1854, the result of which was the discovery 
of a perfect, inscribed cylinder under each of the angles of 
the upper story of this temple, giving us a record of an in- 
valuable kind. The arrow-headed letters of this inscription 
have been deciphered by that eminent scholar in such records, 
Sir Henry Eawlinson ; and they inform us that the temple 
was commenced by King Ur-uck, completed by his son Ilgi, 
and afterward repaired by Nabonidus, king of Babylon.^ 



^ This record also removes an apparent discrepancy between the Scrip- 
tures and profane historians respecting Belshazzar, by informing us that 
Bel-shar-ezer was the oldest son of Nabonidus, and was admitted to share 
in his government. Sir Henry Rawlinson also reads on this cylinder the 
name Kudur-Mapula, which he supposes to be the same as Chedorlaomer. 



52 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT, 

The bricks of which the temple is built bear on them the 
name of Ur-uck. His reign is placed by chronologists at 
B. C. 2230 years, or about 230 years before the call of Abra- 
ham. The temple was dedicated to the goddess Hurki, or 
the Moon. Sir Henry Rawlinson, in consequence of reading 
in this inscription the name Hur, supposes the identification 
of this place With Ur of the Chaldees to be complete. He 
believes that NifFar (see map) was the primitive Calneh 
(Gen. X. 10), that it was dedicated to Belus, and was called 
also by the name of that god ; and that there was the original 
tower of Babel. 

Another item relative to this temple of the Moon-goddess 
Hurki is of importance to us in connection with the subject 
we are now considering. Its angles are exactly toward the 
four points of the compass, as was the case with all the other 
Chaldean temples ; and the large one at Birs-nimrud, near 
the site of ancient Babylon, one hundred and thirty miles 
northwest from this, gives proof that they all had reference 
to astronomy as well as to religion. This at Birs-nimrud 
shows, as well by its distinct stages or offsets as by the care- 
ful pointing of its angles, that it was copied from the more 
primitive ones at Ur ; but it was on a much larger scale, 
having a base two hundred and seventy-two feet on each side 
and a height of one hundred and fifty-six feet, its elevation 
being by seven successive steps. It was designated by Ne- 
buchadnezzar as " The Stages of the Seven Spheres :^' the 
lower story was colored black, in honor of the planet Saturn ; 
the next, orange, for the planet Jupiter ; the third, red, for 
Mars ; the fourth, yellow, for the Sun ; the fifth, green, for 
Venus; the sixth, blue, for Mercury; and the last was sur- 
mounted by a temple, probably white, for the Moon. Re- 
mains of a temple still to be made out at Warka (see map) 
have also these receding steps; and the whole of these struc- 
tures had evidently a close connection with astronomical 
science, which indeed we know was cultivated very largely 



''UR OF THE CHALDEESr 53 

and successfully in those regions. The atmosphere there 
might well induce to contemplations of the heavens ; for 
while, with us, stars of the sixth magnitude are the smallest 
to be seen by the naked eye, there, two magnitudes lower, 
the eighth, are visible without telescopic help. ^'The Chal- 
deans were the first people who reduced their observations 
of the heavens to a regular system. On the authority of 
Berosus^ it is recorded that when Alexander took Babylon, 
Callisthenes forwarded to his relative Aristotle, in Greece, a 
catalogue of eclipses which had been observed at Babylon 
during the previous 1903 years [back to about 2225 B. C.]. 
Ptolemy refers to eclipses in the year 720 B. C, which were 
derived from a Chaldean source. It is to these early astron- 
omers that we are indebted for the Zodiac and the duodeci- 
mal divisions of the day.^^^ 

Perhaps we may find in these earliest temples to their 
gods and to mystic sciences connected with them a sufficient 
cause for the peculiar sacredness of this region ; but, how- 
ever this may have originated, the result is before us in the 
existing immense deposits of human remains, layer above 
layer, to a known height of thirty, and it is supposed of 
even sixty, feet. Mr. Loftus says : ^' It is difficult to convey 
anything like a correct notion of the piles upon piles of hu- 
man relics which utterly astound the beholder. Excepting 
only a triangular space [at Warka] between the three prin- 
cipal ruins, the whole remainder of space within the walls 
and an unknown extent of desert beyond them are every- 
where filled with the bones and sepulchres of the dead. 
There is probably no other site in the world which can 
compare with Warka in this respect; even the tombs of 
ancient Thebes do not contain such an aggregate amount of 
mortality. From its foundation by Urukh until finally 

^ A native of Babylon and priest of Belus, supposed to have lived about 
268 B. C. 

2 Vide Loftus. 
5 * 



54 LIFE- SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT, 

abandoned by the Parthians — a period, probably, of twenty- 
five hundred years — Warka appears to have been a sacred 
burial-place :^^ and not only Warka, but Mugeyer, and indeed 
all this region, seem to have had a peculiar sacredness which 
brought to them the dead from all the regions bordering 
upon the Euphrates and the Tigris. These remains are 
found enclosed in earthenware coffins lined inside with bitu- 
men : those of the more ancient kind are top-shaped, and 
contained only bones, perhaps only a head : more recent 
ones were formed like an oval dish from four to seven feet 
long and from one to three feet in depth : and finally come 
others shaped like slippers. Mr. Taylor discovered, at Mu- 
geyer, a mound full of the dish-covered coffins. 

There are at present two sacred Mohammedan shrines at 
Kerbella and Mashad Ali, only a few miles higher up the 
river, to which believers in that faith of a certain sect bring 
their dead for interment from all parts of Persia and even 
from India. 

Was Mugeyer the ^^ Ur of the Chaldees'^ from which 
Abraham was called ? The proof is clear that the place was 
called Hur or Ur at about Abraham^s time ; that the king 
just previous to that was called Ur-uck ; that he built this 
temple to the goddess ITur or the Moon ; that it was a very 
sacred place and so famous that the simple expression "Ur 
of the Chaldees" would be widely understood and need no 
further explanation. We know also that the ancient Jews, 
and after them the Arabian writers, among whom geogra- 
phy, as well as all other sciences, was thoroughly cultivated, 
designated this as the place. The name may not have be- 
longed to the capital only, but have embraced the adjoining 
district on both sides of the Euphrates. 

There are two other claimants for this distinction 
of being the birth-place of Abraham. One is Ur, a for- 
tress on the Tigris near Habra; but there is no tradi- 
tion in its favor, and the argument for it rests only on its 



GOD IN HISTORY. 55 

identity of name and on its distance from Haran, such as 
seems to be required in the scriptural account. The other 
claimant^ called Orfa, also Urfa, Roha, Orchoe, Callirhoe, 
Chaldeopolis, Edessa and "Antioch of the far East/^ lies 
on the edge of one of the bare, rugged spurs which de- 
scend from the mountains of Armenia into the Assyrian 
plains, and has an advocate in Stanley, formerly Regius 
Professor of Ecclesiastical History in the University of Ox- 
ford. This was undoubtedly an early nucleus of civiliza- 
tion, made so by its natural strength of position and by a 
large fountain of pure water, which springing out there gives 
richness and beauty to the plain below. The belief of the 
Turkish Mohammedans is in its favor, and it had a distin- 
guished position in the early Christian Church ; but an in- 
superable objection to Orfa appears to lie in the fact that 
Chaldea, even in its most extended sense, was never con- 
sidered as reaching so high up as that, not higher than 
Sinjar, which is south of Orfa. This latter place is also only 
a short day^s journey from Haran (Charran), and in sight 
from it, both facts being in opposition to the cause of the 
removal from it as given in Jos. Antiq. i. 6, §5, and also as 
presented in Acts vii. 3. 



CHAPTER IV. 
GOD IN HISTORY, 



ALREADY in Abraham's time idolatry had been tho- 
roughly engrafted upon society all over the world. The 
rapidity of its extension and its universality must seem strange 
to us situated amid our means of constant enlightenment ; but 
we must look back at the world and consider it as it was at 
that period. To worship God as a being seen and felt only 



S6 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT, 

by our intellect and heart is the highest act of our nature ; 
and even in our days of enlightenment and Christianity, 
men are constantly asking aid from the outer senses, and 
procuring it in architectural embellishments, altars, ceremo- 
nies and adornments of various kinds. Man, even in his 
best condition, has a tendency to sensuous religion; that is, a 
religion drawing helps from the outer senses, which helps it 
may appropriate to such a degree as to make the whole of 
religion itself lie in such outward means. 

If this be true in our present enlightened society, what 
must it have been in those very ancient times, when know- 
ledge was scarce and the intellect in a comparatively unedu- 
cated state ? With this tendency to the sensuous in all, men 
could easily be induced to slide into idolatry, through the 
cravings of the heart for objects for its reverence ; and the 
process irlto this is so well described by the great Jewish 
writer, Maimonides (A. D. 1190), that we transcribe it here : 

"In the days of Enos^ the sons of Adam erred with a 
very great error, and the counsels of the wise men of that age 
. became brutish ; and Enos himself was one of those that 
erred ; and the error was this. They said, ^ Forasmuch as 
God has created these stars and spheres to govern the world, 
and set them on high and imparted honor unto them, and 
they are ministers to minister before him, it is well that men 
should laud and glorify them, and give them honor. For 
this is the will of God, that we magnify and honor whatso- 
ever he magnifieth and honoreth ; even as a king would 
have those honored who stand before him ; and this is the 
honor of the king himself.'" 

But such idolatry, however simple in its original forms, 
would very soon degenerate into grossness ; and we know 
that under specious disguises it began immediately to ad- 
minister to the most corrupt and disgusting propensities of 



^ Grandson of Adam, Gen. v. 6. 



GOD IN HISTORY, 57 

man's nature, taking sanctions even under the name of reli- 
gion itself. The sun became Baal or the Sun-god; the 
moon became Ashteroth, the Moon-goddess, the Astarte of 
the Sy/rians and Venus of the Greeks ; the two were con- 
sidered the representative principles of all life, and together 
as the cause of life ; and then, in their temples, and as parts 
of worship, were introduced scenes such as in our cities are 
hid away in filthy purlieus not even fit to be named. 

That was the natural and, indeed, the inevitable tendency 
of idolatry even after commencing in its simplest forms. 
The result would not be otherwise when once the human 
heart had broken loose from God ; time could only add 
grossness, filth and corruption, under which all wickedness 
of the human heart would find disguises and take specious 
names, even those of religion itself. The history of the 
world shows this to be true. 

Would God, we reasonably ask, give the world up to this 
without any sign for himself in its wide extent? Man has 
been made a free agent, as we know in ourselves ; but w^ould 
God abandon this free-agency to every vagary of its powers 
without ever a protest against error or a demonstration for 
the truth as it lies in himself? He who has been so careful 
for our bodies, would he never care for the soul thus striving 
for an object for its reverence and making false gods for its 
worship ? We might assuredly expect that God would not 
thus abandon the world. 

But any continuous proofs for himself would yet have to 
be through human beings, and these beings constituted as 
others are, with passions and frailties and^ tendencies such 
as are common to men. He would not constitute for this a 
perfect nation of perfect men ; for that would require a per- 
petual miracle in each individual case ; but he would take 
people like to other people, and upon them and their history 
would write his own name, to be thus held up before the 
world. Errors there would be among such men, sins often. 



58 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

and then the penalties of sin brought clearly out as penalties ; 
national risings and fallings ; glory and gloom ; but on all 
of these God's righteous dealing stamped, so that the world 
to latest ages might see and know. Indeed, a history like 
this would be an alphabet by which men might read God 
in all other history and might judge and learn. AVhat a 
record that would be ! God in liidory. None would be pre- 
vented from outbreakings in sin, not even the greatest and 
best men ; even these might fall into dark crime ; and then 
perhaps the record of deep contrition and of restoration, or 
else of sure retribution, would be written. A strange, 
chequered history it would be, indeed, must be, if fully 
given, with its full requitals for good or evil ! God in all ! ! 

And then at the last, as we know, there was to be, in this 
history, a most strange and wonderful manifestation of God 
himself in our own nature ; — a perfect man and perfect 
God ; a perfect example and teacher, and then a self-sacrifice 
of himself for the sin of the world. Immeasurably the 
strangest of all histories it would be ! 

There lived in those ancient times at Ur of the Chaldees, 
a family consisting of Terah the father, and several descend- 
ants, who had intermarried among themselves, as was the 
custom in that early period of the world. There had been 
three sons to Terah, but Haran, the oldest of these, was 
now dead; Nahor was the next, and Abram the youngest of 
the three. Haran had left three children, Milcah, Iscah, 
and Lot, and Nahor had married the eldest of these, his 
niece. Abram was married to Sarai, daughter of his 
father, 'but not by his own mother, or, as most Jewish 
writers assert, the same as Iscah ; for although he afterward 
declared her to be his half sister, the word daughter as he 
used it may imply any female descendant, and sister may have 
meant any female relative by blood.' She was a woman of 



* Such was Jewish iisaf^e. 



GOD IN HI ST OR 7', 59 

great beauty, if we may judge from subsequent events. Our 
feelings are shocked by the nearness of this relationship in 
a wife : but such usages had come down from times when 
they were necessary on account of thfe sparseness of popula- 
tion in the world. The group thus united appear to have 
been a pastoral family, and to have lived on the eastern 
side of the Euphrates, if we may suppose Ur to have 
been the name of a district as well as of the capital of the 
country. The family, if we look at it attentively, seems to 
present to us the spectacle of the father ^ and the elder living 
son given to idolatry,^ while Abram stood as an excep- 
tion to the rest. It must have required a great force of 
character and of independent thinking to be an exception in 
such a place as Ur^ so distinguished in the worship of the 
Moon-goddess, and with such an especial sacredness already 
widely established in the eyes of the world. Not to accord 
with the general sentiment would stamp a man with the 
character of free-thinker, simpleton, and a detractor of the 
peculiar honors due to the country and the people. Those 
temples at Ur, although their structure shows them to be of 
the earliest type answering ttf their supposed date, appear 
clearly to indicate a connection between science and national 
worship ; and the man who would stand in open non- 
conformity to the latter, would also appear to be setting 
himself in opposition to the foriii t. We can thus appreci- 
ate the boldness, independence and firmness of Abram in 
any opposition that he might offer to the national sentiment 
and action. Religion and science, and what perhaps it took 
still more courage to oppose, the feeling of peculiar sacred- 
ness in the place, bringing honor and wealth to it from dis- 
tant regions, seemed all to be violated by his holding back 
from the worship of their goddess. It may now almost seem 
to us as if the temples and those immense multitudes of the 



^ See Josh. xxiv. 2 ; Gen. xxxi. 20 ; xxxv. 2. 



6o LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

dead were left in the wide solitudes to testify to us the strong 
specialty of the man whom God took now for his own pur- 
poses of infinite blessings to mankind. 

We see at once that Abram was a man of striking cha- 
racteristics, and had a clear, reasoning head, an independent 
spirit, a good true heart and devout affections : and we are 
prepared now to hear him called by some supernal intima- 
tion — how commenced and afterward continued we know 
not, but recognized clearly by him as from God : " Get thee 
out of thy country, and from thy kindred, and come into 
the land which I shall show thee'^' — a command which he 
made no hesitation in obeying, however surprising it may 
have seemed to him. 

He was then seventy-five years of age. Accompanied by 
his father and brother, and many other members of the fam- 
ily, whom this strong-minded, firm man induced to attend 
him, he left '' Ur of the Chaldees ;^^ and we can see him 
travelling on, whether far up the left bank of the Euphrates, 
or whatever the direction, musing deeply as he went at those 
mysterious words from the God whom he acknowledged. 
He was bound to that God now by a new tie of mysterious 
personal revelations and communings, as he had been before 
to him by reason and his heart's fealty. Whither was he to 
be led ? what was to be the result ? he might naturally 
ask ; and we may well believe that his companions put 
the queries, if he did not ; but as is often the case with 
strongest, clearest minds, there was also in him a child-like, 
confiding spirit, and he led the way over those vast plains 
with unwavering confidence in the divine guidance. 

The country was pleasant ; it is so at all seasons, but es- 
pecially in the spring season, when it is thus described by 
Loftus: ^^ Broad plains of the richest verdure enlivened with 



' Acts vii. 3. 



GOD IN HISTORY, 6l 

flowers of every hue met our delighted gaze on either side 
of the noble river. The cry of the velvet-breasted fran- 
colin and the sand-grouse rushing overhead like the irresist- 
ible wind/^ mingled with the noise of innumerable insects, 
while also the wild bears tempted to the chase. We know 
from Layard how cheerful was often the journeying over 
those vast plains. 

In latitude about 35° 55' N. and longitude Sg^" E. from 
Greenwich, the Euphrates, there flowing eastwardly, is joined 
by the river Belik coming from the north ; and up this river 
about fifty miles, situated between the two branches uniting 
to form it, was Haran, or Padan Aram ; and there the trav- 
ellers paused for a while, in a region beautifully fitted for 
pastoral life. All this country was indeed so fitted ; but it 
was not to be Abram's resting-place, although he seems 
to have been well pleased with the spot. He needed another 
call to induce him to leave. 

Here Terah died, and the bond which had united the 
family around the aged man, then two hundred and five 
years old, was severed. 

Here also was sundered the brotherly tie between Nahor 
and Abram; for the latter was called to proceed still 
farther, and Nahor preferred to remain in the attractive re- 
gion of Haran. The older brother was indeed not yet free 
from idolatrous tendencies, and it was doubtless best that 
Abram should be isolated from any such influences exerted 
upon his household. 

The divine call here was clear and full and emphatic, and 
accompanied with promises of blessing that might well cheer 
the man destined to be an alien from country and friends. 
" Get thee out of thy country, and from thy kindred, and 
from thy father's house, unto a land that I will show thee ; 
and I will make of thee a great nation, and I will bless 
thee, and make thy name great ; and thou shalt be a bless- 
ing. And I will bless them that bless thee, and curse him 



] 



62 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

that curseth thee ; and in thee shall all families of the earth 
be blessed/^ 

There have been many conjectures as to the manner of 
these supernatural communications to Abram. They seem 
to be resolved into four methods, — voices, apparitions, vis- 
ions and the powerful agency of the Spirit of God : any cu- 
riosity on the subject, hoAvever, though it may seem rational, 
is not gratified. The Scriptures merely speak of these 
strange, mysterious visitations as they would of common 
facts ; and while we are startled, and wonder, there is no 
explanation, as if the simple announcement was to be satis- 
factory to our minds. To Abram, the divine communica- 
tion, however it might come, was satisfactory, as was proved 
by his immediate, implicit obedience now and on subsequent 
occasions, however painful and even terrible that course of 
obedience at times threatened to be. Manly as he was, and 
strong in many characteristics, when God^s will was mani- 
fested to him he showed a ready yielding of his own will, a 
child-like simplicity of trust like that impressed upon us in 
our Saviour's teaching, when he put children before his dis- 
ciples and said, "Of such are the kingdom of heaven.^^ 
Abram had weaknesses : he fell into sin both base and 
shameful, as we shall see by and by : God did not take him 
as a perfect man ; but there is, as the most striking trait in 
his life, this yielding of will, this simple trust, which make 
us feel that he was the worthiest of all men for this high 
honor put upon him by his Maker. 

lie trusted implicitly in this new call to go: and taking 
with him his wife and nephew Lot, "and all their substance 
that they had gathered, and the souls that they had gotten 
in Haran," started on his journey, not knowing whither it 
would lead, but trmting. . How firm and strono; he was in 
that trust ! 

Thus strangely led, and commanded to journey on, this 
company of travellers now took their course from Haran 



GOD IN HIS TORT. 63 

toward the unknown West; the land unknown, the purpose 
of the journey unknown, the end unknown. They only 
knew that God had spoken and was their guide. Abram 
was now cut oflf from all old associates and from kindred, 
except the little company with him, which quickly began 
to be a mere speck in the deserts of sand into which their 
way soon led them. From even these few companions of 
his journey he was in a great measure isolated by that mys- 
terious companionship which seemed to make him a unit on 
the earth. As he went on, his strong common sense must 
have revolved the singular past, the singular promises for 
the future, the singular uncertainty of location before him ; 
and if puzzling questions were not started in his own mind, 
they were put to him by others, none of which he was able 
to answer, except only this one : God had spoken ; he was 
to obey. How far satisfactory such reply might be to those 
with him, toiling on over the sands and parched with thirst, 
and how far satisfactory to his wife, as she and all compared 
the present prospect around them with the rich lands and 
verdure they had left behind, must have depended on their 
faith ; and in their present condition and surroundings the 
strongest faith would be apt to droop, and perhaps to change 
into repining and rebellion. 

The desert of Arabia lying westward from Mesopotamia 
stretches far upward toward the north, and it here interposed 
its parched, dreary sands on their way. Their route was 
doubtless by what afterward became the caravan-way from 
Assyria through Palmyra to Damascus ; for only on this 
way are fountains to be met with, and those but few and at 
long intervals. Around these fountains vegetation springs 
up and nature takes a refreshing aspect, but between them 
are only level stretches of utterly barren sands, or hills 
equally as bare and forbidding as are the yellow, scorched 
valleys that lie between their white, rocky sides. 

Thus the company of travellers moved on, till, at the end 



64 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT, 

of eight or nine days from Haran, the green plain about 
Damascus opened before them, and beyond it the great 
range of Anti-Lebanon stretched its vast length, terminated 
at its southern part by Hermon lifting its snow-crowned 
summits eight thousand feet into the sky. 

How long they paused in their journey at this place is 
uncertain : but beautiful as is, and was then, this most fer- 
tile region watered by the Abana and Pharpar, it was not 
to be their home. They turned here doubtless to the south- 
ward, through what is now the Hauran, a most fertile re- 
gion, and then already thickly peopled, as houses apparently 
built in those days and still standing, almost uninjured by 
time, now testify. Here again the company came in contact 
with the worship of the Moon-goddess, and even a city, 
Ashteroth Karnaim^ (the horned or crescented Ashteroth), 
called by her name. Here were dwelling the Rephaim, races 
of men famous for their gigantic proportions, with which 
the descendants of Abram were afterward to come in warlike 
collision. 

Thus they proceeded onward toward the south, among the 
hills, covered with the " oaks of Bashan,^^ and along the 
rich valleys of that region, until presently they struck the 
river Jabbok ; and then turning westwardly they reached 
the Jordan, crossing which they saw about them their de- 
stined home, the land of Canaan.^ 



1 See Gen. xiv. 5. 

2 The route given here is in its first part the one required in order to find 
water across the desert. The latter part is inferred by their reaching 
Canaan first at Sliechem. It was also the route evidently followed by 
Jacob on his return from Haran. 



IN CANAAN, 65 



CHAPTER V. 
IN CANAAN. 

THEIR first stopping-place might well have put them 
in love with their new home ; for it must always have 
been a delightful spot^ and it is at this day considered the 
garden of Palestine. In fertility it was equal^ and in 
variety of aspect it was far superior, to the place of their 
former residence by the Euphrates. A plain about twelve 
miles long stretches here from north to south. On the west 
of it rise two mountains about eight hundred feet high, 
separated by a valley one thousand feet in width ; and pro- 
ceeding up this valley a short distance we come to fountains, 
of which there is a succession still further westwardly, 
giving unrivalled fertility to all this region. Fruit and other 
trees clothe the hill-sides, and the whole garden-like place 
is musical with the songs of birds, which congregate here in 
unusual numbers. Here was in those days, Sichem (She- 
chem) — now Nablous — and here by one of the large trees 
of the country, the terebinth^ of Moreh, Abram pitched 
his tent for a temporary sojourn. We leave them in this 
encampment while we take a brief survey of the people 
among whom they had come to make their dwelling. 

Of the three great families coming immediately from 
Noah, the Japhetic appears to have taken its course to the 
northward, whence it spread in various directions, giving to 
a large part of Asia, to Europe, and finally to America, the 

^ The word translated plain in our version means terebinth, the Pistacia 
Terebinthus of Linnaeus, the Butm tree of the present natives. Robin- 
son says of it : " It spreads its branches far and wide like a noble oak. 
It is not an evergreen, but its small feathered, lancet-shaped leaves fall in 
autumn and are renewed in the spring." 
6* 



66 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT, 

origin of their various populations. The Shemitic continued 
to occupy the original place of settlement along the Eu- 
phrates, whence they spread so as to occupy all the fertile 
region of Mesopotamia. The descendants of Ham emi- 
grated to the westward, occupying the southern part of 
Arabia, Ethiopia, Egypt and Canaan; and in the immense 
enlargement of Japhet, as well as in the history of the other 
two great classes of families, we have a striking fulfilment 
of the prophecy of their progenitor. (Gen. ix. 25-27). 

Abram, therefore, when he entered Canaan found himself 
among the descendants of Ham ; but they seem to have 
been sparsely scattered, and to have been chiefly a pastoral 
people, though not always dwellers in tents. AVliile occu- 
pying settled habitations, they sent out their flocks to graze 
as pasturage could best be found ; and only two spots are 
mentioned where cities could be seen. One of these was at 
Kirjath-arba (the city of Arba, also Hebron^), and the other 
was the group of five cities, (probably small ones) at the 
spot where is now the southern end of the Dead Sea. Arba, 
after whom the former was named, had been a distinguished 
man among the giant race^ belonging to that region as well 
as to the country east of the Jordan through which Abram 
had first passed. We have a record of the tribe of Amor- 
ites at this time, occupying the high grounds in and about 
Hebron, a warlike race, who afterward carried their arms 
across the Jordan and became possessors of a large region 
cast of that river. We have also a notice at this time of 
the Perizzites, or, according to the meaning of their name*, 
dwellers in plains ; but the people generally went under the 
designation of Hittites, called so from Hcth, a grandson of 
Noah by Canaan. The language spoken through this coun- 
try had a resemblance to that of Mesopotamia, and the new 
party of immigrants had little difficulty in making themselves 



^ See Gen. xxiii. 2. 2 josh. xiv. 15. 



IN CANAAN. 67 

understood among the people of the land.* We are struck at 
once, however, and throughout the history of Abram, with 
the manner in which he kept himself and his tribe distinct 
from all these dwellers in Canaan. He was courteous and 
sufficiently affable, and although always preserving a clear 
separation from them, was popular as well as respected ; but 
he never seemed to forget that his family was in a distinct 
position among them and w^as to be kept clearly marked as 
such. 

We see him now at Sichem (Shechem), feeling that a 
strange, supernatural power was surrounding him and was 
pointing to a most wonderful future, which, if his curiosity 
tempted him to peer into it, took many changing and always 
indistinct shapes. Here again "the Lord appeared unto 
Abram and said to him, ' Unto thy seed will I give this 
land.^ ^^ He bowed his whole soul in deep reverence ; and at 
this place he erected an altar to nxnjn mn% '^Jehovah beheldJ^ 

Removing from Shechem, he travelled twenty-five miles 
further to the south, aud pitched his tent on an elevated 
spot, famous afterward as Bethel. He had now, as before, 
one of the finest tracts of pasturage in the whole land, re- 
markable still for two good fountains, and commanding an 
extensive view of the country. Here also he built an altar, 
and " called upon the name of the Lord.^^ But the beauty 
of the place and its fountains and convenience for pasturage 
did not long detain him there. There seems to have been 
in him, what indeed we might expect at this time, a desire 
to examine the land which God had promised to his descend- 
ants ; and leaving Bethel, he travelled on further toward 
the south, by the spot so famous long afterward as the site 
of the great capital, Jerusalem ; along over the plains, and 
by the hills afterward and now distinguished as the site of 

1 A long inscription on a sarcophagus disinterred near Sidon in 1854 has 
such a close resemblance to the Hebrew as to cause little difficulty in reading 
it. The letters used on it will be noticed in another part of this work. 



68 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT, 

Bethlehem ; and then still farther southwardly, looking as 
he went at hill and dale, and revolving in his mind the 
promises made and the strange mysteries of that future for 
which, it had been told him, he was designed. 

He walked as a man would walk in a dream, and yet 
knowing that the dream was an actual fact and that all 
about him were tangible realities. But still in the dream. 
He was a man of too much reasoning power not to reason ; 
and of too much practical sense not to look for actualities 
and to take hold of them as such. He was not given to 
visionary ideas and fancies ; for his life shows him to have 
been a man of strong sense and of good common perceptions 
and judicious treatment of facts. And yet he was led in a 
way beyond his power to reason about it ; and the future 
was all to be that which his reason could not fathom or in 
it find a certain standing-place for any observations or even 
surmisings. But he was not troubled with doubts. God 
had spoken ; he believed ; he was content in that belief. 

The country as it came under his eye was fair to look 
upon, and the inhabitants were peaceably disposed. There 
was room sufficient for his flocks yet few in number, as well 
as for theirs ; and thus he moved onward in that independ- 
ent life belonging to a pastoral people, pitching his tents as 
choice led him over an extent of country free to all. 

But gradually a change came over all the country ; and 
the newly-arrived family, keenly attentive to every event, 
were by and by filled with dismay on finding not only 
that the beauty and attractiveness of the region were gone, 
but that they were themselves involved in one of the direst 
calamities that can anywhere befall a people. Palestine is 
peculiarly dependent on rains for the very existence of its 
inhabitants. Its large river, the Jordan, runs in a channel 
sunk more than a thousand feet below the general level of 
the country, and can afford no help for irrigation. Other 
streams are lew and very scant in tluMr supply; rains are 



IN CANAAN, 69 

uncertain, and sometimes utterly fail ; and when the latter 
is the case, vegetation is soon burnt up, springs and wells 
are dry, the soil is turned to powder, all living things begin 
to perish ; the horrors of famine are on the land. So it was 
now. Abram and his family saw, with sickening feelings, 
the progress of a long, uninterrupted drought, the sky like 
brass, the sun fiery and scorching all things, vegetation dead. 
And soon also their own lives were in danger from the in- 
creasing famine, against which there had been no former 
experiences to guard them, and no time indeed for prepara- 
tion. They were compelled to fly, — to fly from the " prom- 
ised land ^^ almost as soon as they had reached it ; and to 
gain which they had travelled so far, and had given up so 
many comforts in their former home. 

Egypt was then, as it still is, a granary for all nations far 
and near; and Abram, taking his family, started for at least 
a temporary refuge in that country, his little company carry- 
ing such feelings with them as we can very well imagine. 
His wife seems to have been fretful and impatient at other 
times when there was nothing peculiarly trying to temper ; 
and here the circumstances would be a severe test of temper 
in any one. Many questions, doubtless, she had put to him 
in the long journey, respecting his future purposes or the 
reasons for present conduct, which he had found it difficult, 
if not impossible, to answer ; for the manifestations from 
God had not been to the family, but to him ; and all at 
Haran, as we know, had not believed in them. To puzzling 
questions he could only give, in reply, his own firmness of 
belief. But such reply would often savor to others more of 
simplicity and weakness than of strength of mind ; and, at 
all times, would not be apt to give full satisfaction to the 
questioners. Still less satisfactory would his answers be 
under such circumstances as the present. Was his own 
belief indeed entirely unshaken now, as faint through in- 
sufficiency of food, and weary and thirsty, they dragged 



7o LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT, 

themselves over that long waste of utterly barren country 
(about one hundred miles) lying between Palestine and 
Egypt? This region, part of the Arabian desert, was at 
all times perfectly dry, except during the winter rains, and 
it would now be peculiarly gloomy and wearisome. God 
might seem to some of the travellers to have quite deserted 
them. 



CHAPTER VI. 
IN EG TFT, 

EGYPT was reached at last, and they breathed again ; 
for they were amid plenty, and they were drinking the 
waters of the Nile, that stream from which no one even of 
the most favored countries ever drinks without wishing that 
he could drink of it through all his life. What makes its 
waters so delicious no one has informed us, but the fact that 
they are unequalled to the taste is acknowledged by every 
person who has ever quaffed them. The travellers now not 
only drank with delight, but they found a double joy in the 
resemblance of the country to their own native land, where 
the Euphrates courses along between its level, flower-decked 
shores. They compared with both of these the land from 
which they had just fled, the parched, sunburnt Canaan, 
where all life was perishing. Did Abram's faith, through 
all this, still preserve its earlier firmness and strength ? 

Whatever might now be his thoughts respecting his former 
calls to leave his early home for Canaan, he had here before 
him present, tangible realities for which he felt that he must 
be prepared. The difficulties in pre])aring for them were 
increased l)y the utter strangeness of all things around him, 
the country, the ])e()ple, the wonderful architectural struc- 



IN EG TFT, 71 

tiires, the despotic government, the religion ; all so new and 
much of it overwhelming to any mind. He passed along 
by obelisks and temples ; there, before him were the Pyra- 
mids, those structures which have ever since filled the world 
with astonishment; he passed close by them after crossing 
the Nile, an'd by the tombs of nobles, great costly structures 
clustered at the Pyramids and covered with imposing sculp- 
tured forms; passed along the crowded roads filled with 
people of strange habits; and now, just before him was 
Memphis, that city so immense that to look at it might 
well utterly confound the dweller on the wide northern and 
eastern plains, the man to Avhom the confinement even in a 
single house would seem to be suffocating. 

But he was forced to stop at Memphis by a terrible dis- 
aster which suddenly befell his company. His wife was 
taken from him, and carried to the royal palace ! The beauty 
of Jewish women has been proverbial, from the oldest times 
down to our day ; and Sarai, from whom they are descended, 
seems to have been, in looks, worthy to be the mother of 
such a race. ^^The Egyptians beheld the woman that she 
was very fair. The princes also of Pharaoh saw her and 
commended her before Pharaoh ; and the woman was taken 
into Pharaoh's house.'' 

We come now to an .event that must be felt to be a dark 
blot on the life of Abram himself. He had, from the 
time of leaving Ur, foreseen that wherever they might go, 
Sarai's great beauty would attract attention, and might, in 
those lawless countries, cause danger to himself; and he had 
induced her to unite with him in a purpose of joint decep- 
tion in case of difficulties. He was to declare her to be his 
sister, and she was to call him her brother; both of which 
were terms indeed true as regarded that relationship, but 
false as regarded the purpose designed, which was to conceal 
their relation as man and wife. 

It is most painful to know that he, Avhom we would fain 



72 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT, 

have considered a great and thoroughly good man, and whom 
we would wish to make a hero, was false to honor and truth — 
that he was guilty of lying; for such was indeed the act which 
we are now considering. The act was false and base ; and 
was doubly mean, because it was a meanness toward a 
woman, and that woman his wife. 

The Arabs to this day are peculiarly given to lying. Tra- 
vellers say that, when a bargain is made with them, they are 
* strict in fulfilling it, and that property confided to them is 
safe even to the minutest item, however it may be ex- 
posed ; but in bargaining they set truth utterly at defiance ; 
and in their general intercourse, have little hesitation in vio- 
lating it, even when nothing is gained to them by the act. 
Probably the nomadic life, having in it none of the pressure 
of close communities, where truth is felt to be most essential 
to the existence of society, may be productive of such a 
license to the tongue. Even stealing, in some communities, 
has been considered not only allowable, but praiseworthy, if 
not detected ; but honesty and truth always have their foun- 
dations in righteousness itself, and are not dependent on any 
usages of society. 

AVe yield up Abram, therefore, from any unqualified ap- 
probation, and recognize in him not a hero in history, but a 
weak and sinning man, even mean and base in this sin. God 
had taken him, not because he was perfect, but because he 
had a great purpose to accomplish through him. There was 
no perfect man to be taken. There has been, in all time, 
only One Perfect Being on the earth. Teacher and Saviour 
and God himself. AVe leave this blot on Abram as we find 
it in the Scriptures; and feel its prominence to be the more 
striking in consequence of his other traits, which must com- 
mend themselves to us, — his simplicity of character, his gen- 
tleness, his singleness of adherence to God, his implicit 
yielding of his own will to God's will. With all manliness 
in intellect he was simple as a child. In this instance he 



IN EGYPT, 73 

was a coward ; yet in another case, yet to be seen, he was 
brave and bold, where he might easily have shrunk from 
danger and have pleaded the overwhelming multiplicity of 
the foes he so courageously pursued and fought. 

If it should be asked here, how he who was so marked 
of heaven and called of God could have fallen into such a 
sin as that which we are now contemplating, we will remem- 
ber that men, even if favored as Abram was, had in those 
times very few means of studying duty or of gaining intel- 
ligence, or of strengthening their logical perceptions of right. 
Of books there were very few in existence, and these were 
confined in circulation. Among nomads probably there 
were none at all. Oral traditions of events and genealogies 
of families could convey very few principles for men^s action, 
and few clear teachings of what was right. As respected 
what was right in principle or practice men had to feel their 
way slowly ; and even long afterward, in enlightened Greece 
and Rome, people often groped blindly and failed to receive 
the truth. In Sparta, as just noticed, stealing was commend- 
able, if the theft was concealed; only discovery brought 
condemnation and shame to the perpetrator. 

In the case of Abram, the divine protection was now in- 
terposed to save him and his wife from the consequences of 
their sin. When a woman was received as she had been, in 
the house of an Eastern prince, it was customary to make 
her undergo certain purifications before her adoption as wife; 
and previous to the completion of them in this instance, the 
monarch found his household visited with ^^ plagues'^ of some 
kind or other, made sufl&cient to reveal to him the truth. 
Abram had in the mean time been enriched, for her sake, 
with very many gifts such as in pastoral life would be most 
valued, including camels, and also with men-servants and 
maid-servants. He was now sent for by the monarch, and 
upbraided with his base conduct; and then, husband and 
wife were dismissed, the gifts being still allowed to remain 

7 



74 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

in their possession. Thus ended an event discreditable to 
both of them, and especially so to him. 

We must here take notice of a very singular episode in 
the history of Egypt itself; for the subject comes before us in 
the questions, who was this Pharaoh, and why was the treat- 
ment to Abram, a shepherd, so different from that given to 
the descendants and followers of his grandson Jacob, also 
shepherds, who had to be put in a separate corner of the 
kingdom, because, as they were informed, '^ every shepherd 
is an abomination to the Egyptians V^ This contempt for 
shepherds is also shown in numerous places on the monu- 
ments of Egypt, where people in that employment are repre- 
sented as lame or deformed, dirty, unshaven and even of a 
ludicrous appearance, and often clad with the matting similar 
in quality to the covering thrown over the backs of the oxen 
they are tending.^ Some of these sculptures are on the 
tombs at the bases of the Pyramids, and may have been seen 
by Abram himself as he passed by, for those tombs belong 
to periods antecedent to his time. The honor with which 
he, a shepherd, was received and treated may have been 
owning to Sarai, but seems scarcely to be accounted for in 
that manner ; and so especially the nature of the presents 
given, — royal gifts presented to him, consisting chiefly of 
sheep and oxen. When Joseph^s brethren came into Egypt, 
II Joseph was the highest authority in the land next to the 

king, yet he was compelled by the Egyptian scorn for shep- 
herds to give them a region where they would not feel this 
hatred and contempt. 

There seems to have been a difference between the people 
of Egypt in these two periods of time; and it is in perfect 
accordance with what we know of two very different epochs 
in that country ; — one, a rulership by shepherd Icings^ and 
another, the government by native Egyptian kings. 



See Wilkinfton^B " Ancient Egyptians." 



IN EGYPT. 75 

The fact of the coming into that country in the very 
ancient times of a numerous race of shepherds, of the con- 
quest of the country by them, and of their rule over it 
for several centuries, is admitted by all Egyptologists, 
although some difference of opinion exists as to the period 
and the time of this occupancy. The circumstance of such 
occupancy is, indeed, quite unnoticed on the monuments, 
which record only events honorable to the country or to the 
sovereign by whom they were erected ; but we arrive at a 
knowledge of it partly by perceptible gaps among the events 
there recorded, and fully and satisfactorily in the history 
and the lists of sovereigns by Manetho, who was a high 
priest of the temple of Isis at Sebenytus in Lower Egypt in 
the reign of the first Ptolemy (322 to 284 B. C.) "Al- 
though,^^ says Lepsius, '^ his history is lost, we have his 
dynasties tolerably entire. His excellence as a historian is 
placed in the clearest light by the monuments which are 
now made accessible to us, and the notices concerning him 
transmitted to us by the Greek and Latin authors are in no 
respects contradictory. The lists of Manetho comprise 
thirty dynasties.^^ His own works have perished, but nearly 
his entire lists of sovereigns are preserved in the writings 
of Eusebius, Julius Africanus, in part by Josephus; and a 
portion of his Egyptian history is transmitted to us by 
Josephus. The last is the more fully reliable, because it is 
quoted literally by that writer in his controversy with 
Apion ; and Apion, born in Oasis, in Egypt, and having his 
home afterward at Alexandria, was the author of a learned 
treatise on the antiquities of Egypt, and was hostile to the 
Jews. Anything quoted by Josephus, in a controversy with 
him, would consequently have to be given with great care 
and accuracy; and we are therefore able to make extracts 
with confidence from his history so given. 

Manetho says, " There was a king of ours whose name 
was Timaus. Under him it came to pass, I know not how. 



76 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

that God was averse to us, and there came, after a surprising 
manner, men of ignoble birth out of the eastern parts, and 
had boldness enough to make an expedition into our coun- 
try, and with ease subdued it by force, yet without our 
hazarding a battle with them. So when they had gotten 
those that governed us under their power, they afterward 
burnt down our cities and demolished the temples of the 
gods, and used all the inhabitants after a most barbarous 
manner ; nay, some they slew, and led their children and 
wives into slavery. At length they made one of themselves 
king, whose name was Salatis ; he also lived at Memphis, 
and made both the upper and lower regions pay tribute, and 
left garrisons in places that were most proper for them. He 
chiefly aimed to secure the eastern parts, as foreseeing that 
the Assyrians, who had then the greatest power, would be 
desirous of that kingdom and invade them, and as he found 
in the Saite Nomos, a city very proper for his purpose, and 
which lay upon the Bubastic channel, but with regard to a 
certain theologic notion was called Avaris,^ this he rebuilt 
and made very strong by the walls he built about it, and by 
a most numerous garrison of two hundred and forty thous- 
and armed men whom he put into it to keep it.^^ [The 
names of his six successors, all of whom were occupied in 
completing the subjugation of the country are next given.] 
" This whole nation was styled Hyksos, that is Shepherd- 
kings; for the first syllable Hyc^ according to the sacred 
dialect, denotes a hhiff, as is Sos a shepherd^ but this accord- 
ing to the ordinary dialect ; and of these is compounded 
Hyksos ; but some people say that these people were Arabi- 
ans. These people,'^ Manetho proceeds to say, " kept posses- 
sion of Egypt five hundred and eleven^ years;" and he adds 
that, finally, " the kings of Thcbais and of the other parts of 



* Supposed to liave been wliere Pelusium was afterward built. 

' Bunsen estimates the time at nine hundred and twenty-two years. 



IN EGTPT. 77 

Egypt made an insurrection against the shepherds/^ and 
that ^' a terrible and long war was made between them/^ 
At last the strangers were driven out of all parts of the 
country except the fortified place, Avaris, " which contained 
ten thousand acres/^ and where they were besieged by four 
hundred and eighty thousand men headed by Thummosis, 
son of the Egyptian king, who, in despair of taking the 
place, ^' came to a composition with them that they should 
leave Egypt and go without any harm to be done them, 
whithersoever they would ; and after this composition was 
made they went away with their whole families and effects, 
not fewer in number than two hundred and forty thousand, 
and took their journey from Egypt through the wilderness 
for Syria ;'^ and he proceeds then to say that " they went 
northward and built Jerusalem/^ ^ 

Indeed, it is probable that long before their final expul- 
sion, branches of this restles-s, roving set of people had scat- 
tered northwardly along the eastern shores of the Mediterra- 
nean, carrying with them from Egypt the germs of many 
useful ideas, which we shall have a future occasion to notice, 
and which, through Phoenicia to Greece, have come even 
over to our own country. They probably formed the race 
of Philistines in Canaan ; for in the languages of Western 
Asia, whence they originally came, Pali means shepherds 
and Stan or Sthan signifies land^ and Palistan, whence Phil- 
istines, means the Land of Shepherds ^ the Hyhsos of the 
Egyptian language. From this comes our word Palestine. 

The easterly origin of the shepherd-kings of Egypt ap- 
pears to receive a singular elucidation in the sacred books 
of the Hindoos, which record two migrations from the East 
in remote times ; first of the Yadavas or sacred race, and 
secondly of the Pali or shepherds, called Pali-putras in those 
annals (Pali-bothri in Pliny). The last, we are informed 



^ Jos. Con. Ap. §14. 

7* 



78 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

by these Hindoo records, were a powerful race, occupying 
the country between the Indus and mouth of the Ganges, 
whence, with the roving habits of a pastoral people, they 
spread over a great part of Asia, Africa and Europe. A 
portion of them, crossing the Persian Gulf and spreading 
through Arabia Felix, reached the Red Sea, crossing which 
they occupied a region on its western shore called in the 
Grecian histories Barbaria, from the word Berber, a shep- 
herd. Traces of these early rovers are said by Bruce to be 
found as a distinct race in Abyssinia, different in appearance 
from the other inhabitants, and still a pastoral people, living 
in tents and leading a roving life. They seem to have been 
the Eastern Ethiopians, as distinct from the Western noticed 
in Herodotus and Homer. 

We shall in a future chapter of the present work endeavor 
to settle the period of this expulsion of the Hyksos from 
Egypt; and if the chronology we shall there trace out be 
correct, then the time of Abram's visit to Egypt was at the 
latter part of their dominion,^ when, by long residence, they 
had changed greatly from their primitive habits and had 
become Egyptianized in character and civilization, while 
still retaining their old shepherd proclivities; exactly as the 
Mongolian conquerors and rulers of China, a shepherd race, 
present themselves in our own time greatly changed and 
softened by the influence of their subjects. 

This will account for the treatment which Abram re- 
ceived, and the nature of the gifts presented to him ; and as 
the expulsion of the Hyksos and restoration of the Egyptian 
power occurred before Jacob came to that country, it will 
explain the grandeur in the new dynasties amid which Jo- 
seph's glory shone out, and the fact of the hatred toward the 



^ Modern writers on the monuments and history of Egypt differ greatly 
as respects chronology, according as they make dynasties successive or in 
part simultaneous; but almost all of them agree in making Abram's visit 
to have been during the time of the shepherd-kings. 



IN PALESTINE, 



79 



pastoral race, in consequence of which the Hebrews had 
to be isolated in a corner of the kingdom, because " every 
shepherd is an abomination unto the Egyptians/^ 



CHAPTER VII. 



IN PALESTINE, 

IT was a greatly enlarged party which followed the He- 
brew chief as he left Egypt and took his course back- 
ward toward Canaan ; for now " Abram was very rich in 
cattle and silver and in gold/^ The monarch had bestowed 
upon him "sheep and oxen and he-asses, and men-servants 
and maid-servants, and she-asses and camels," and at the 
last, also royal gifts from his treasury.* The gifts were in- 
deed made in kingly style. 




From Wilkinson. 



From Lepsins. 
Egyptian Money, as represented on the Monunnents ; the White is Silver, the Black is 
Gold: also, a Man Weighing Money. 



1 See Gen. xiii. 2. Money among the Egyptians at that time consisted 
of rings of gold and silver, and there were public weighers whose business 



8o LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

Attractive as Egypt was to him and liis party, it was still 
not to be his permanent home ; for the divine admonitions 
had designated Canaan as the country for this purpose; and 
therefore, when the famine had passed, and grass for his 
flocks was to be had, he crossed again the wide intervening 
desert region; and then, having still advanced northwardly, 
stopped once more on the heights of Bethel, where he had 
formerly halted on his journey and had built an altar. And 
here once more he " called on the name of the Lord/^ 

Lot was still with him, and had also increased in pastoral 
wealth ; and here now, both his uncle and himself, even in 
these wide abundant pastures, were feeling the customary 
effects of prosperity and riches. Their herdsmen were hav- 
ing contentions and were bringing in complaints, which 
threatened to disturb the harmony among the chiefs them- 
selves ; and Abram came to the unwelcome conclusion that 



it was to see that the weight was just. None of this money has been found 
among the antiquities of that country, but on their monuments are figures 
representing both the gold and silver currency, the latter being styled in 
the accompanying hieroglyphics "white gold." Silver appears to have 
been chiefly in use for the purpose of ornament. Egypt had no coined 
money till it was introduced by the Persians after their conquest of that 
country ; nor have any such pieces, of times previous to the Persian rule, 
been discovered in Phoenicia, although this might have been expected (if 
at any place) in a commercial country like the last. The first coined 
money (i. e. with an impression on it) known is that of the Lydian kings 
and of Egina, about the eighth century B. C. The first absolutely Jewish 
coin was in the time of Simon Maccabeus, B. C. 139 ; obverse. Shekel Is- 
rael ; reverse, Jerusalem Kedoshah (the holy). 

This notice respecting Abram is the first we have in the Bible of the use 
of the precious metals. That may signify bullion, but more probably it 
was the ring money or some other settled form of exchange. In Gen. 
xvii. 13 and xxiii. 16, xx. 16, the reference seems to be clearly to some 
known form ; and in Gen. xxxvii. 25, 28, to one recognized from Gilead 
to Egypt. In Gen. xlii. 35, the expression is bundles of money ; and in 
xliii. 21, it was said to be "in full weight," probably rings of silver which 
could be estimated separately or in the gross by weight. See "Madden's 
Hist, of Jewish Coinage." 



IN PALESTINE. 8 1 

he and his nephew must separate ; for " the land was not 
able to bear them, that they might dwell together: for their 
substance was so great that they could not dwell together/' 
He was very generous in his proposal to Lot, when it had 
become painfully evident that they must part. " Let there 
be no strife, I pray thee, between me and thee, and between 
my herdsmen and thy herdsmen : for we be brethren,'' was 
his conciliatory language. He then offered to his kinsman 
the choice of the whole country. If Lot should choose the 
right hand, he would go to the left ; if the left hand, he 
would go to the right. 

The spot where they stood commanded an extensive pros- 
pect, and especially down into a region that might very well 
attract the preference of Lot and his party, so recently from 
Egypt. For just below them was the valley of the Jordan, 
with a climate which through long subsequent ages was pro- 
verbial as Egyptian^ and also a plain which was afterward, 
and doubtless then also, famous for its tropical palm trees, 
and a soil well watered and remarkable for its fertility. It 
was bringing Egypt, so pleasant in its associations, once more 
close to his side. Fatally for himself. Lot chose this place. 

The whole valley of the Jordan and its lakes is a very 
singular one. It looks as if by some convulsion in the earth 
a long chasm had been made, commencing near the foot of 
Hebron, and deepening southwardly till the waters at the 
lake of Tiberias are six hundred and twenty-two feet below 
the level of the Mediterranean ; whence again this chasm 
goes on deepening rapidly, till finally the surface of the Dead 
Sea is thirteen hundred and twelve feet below the Mediter- 
ranean level. This convulsion doubtless occurred long be- 
fore Abram's time ; but the rocks of that region show a vol- 
canic origin ; and volcanoes to this day heave and disturb the 
land. 

The place where Abram and Lot were standing at Bethel 
is about twenty-eight hundred feet above the Mediterranean 



82 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

level, and the plain of Jericho, only four miles distant, was 
about thirty-nine hundred feet below them. A wady or glen 
at their side led down to the plain, and opened on it at a spot 
where a fountain sufficient to turn mills still gushes from 
the earth. The whole plain is to this day watered to an 
unusual degree by large fountains. Its soil has always been 
famous for its fertility and the place remarkable for the 
tropical nature of its productions. Directly at the south of 
it is the Dead Sea, a body of water forty-six statute miles 
long by nine and a half in its widest part, its greatest depth 
being thirteen hundred feet. Twenty-seven miles from its 
northern end, however, the sea is narrowed by a low, flat 
promontory extending from the mountains at its eastern 
side, so as. to be here only from three to five miles wide, 
with a depth so greatly diminished that it can be forded at 
certain seasons of the year. On its western side, bare, rug- 
ged hills rise abruptly from the sea, and are the beginning 
of a district some twelve or fifteen miles in width, looking, 
says the traveller Maundrell, " As if the earth had suffered 
some great convulsion in which the very bowels had been 
turned outward.'' On the east, mountains rise to a height 
of two or three thousand feet, and are seamed by ravines 
down which streams descend, giving fertility to their sides. 
At the southern end of this sea commences the Wady Ara- 
bah, eight or ten miles wide, at first low and marshy, then 
higher, and so passing off* southwardly, with high mountains 
on either side, to the gulf of Akabah, the eastern arm of the 
Red Sea. At the southwestern edge of the Dead Sea is a 
ridge of pure salt, four miles long by one hundred and fifty 
feet in height, and at the northern end of this ridge comes 
in, from the west, Wady Mahawat, the sides of which at the 
present day give intimations of the manner in which the 
great catastrophe to this region was produced soon after the 
separation between Abram and Lot. A recent traveller says, 
'' There are exposed on the sides of the wady, and chiefly on 



IN PALESTINE. 83 

the south, large masses of bitumen mingled with gravel. 
These overlie a thin stratum of sulphur, which again over- 
lies a thicker stratum of sand, so strongly impregnated with 
sulphur that it yields powerful fumes on being sprinkled 
over a hot coal. Many great blocks of bitumen have been 
washed down the gorge, and lie scattered over the plain 
below, along with huge boulders and other traces of tremen- 
dous floods The layer of sulphurous sand is gene- 
rally evenly distributed on the old limestone base, the 
sulphur evenly above it and the bitumen in variable masses. 
In every way it differs from the ordinary mode of deposit 
of these substances, as we have seen them elsewhere. Again, 
the bitumen, unlike that which we pick up on the shore, is 
strongly impregnated with sulphur, and yields an overpow- 
ering sulphurous odor ; above all it is calcined, and bears 
the marks of having been subjected to extreme heat. In 
weight and appearance it differs from the bitumen on the 
shore, as coke does from ordinary coal.^'^ 

The bitumen on the seiashore above referred to is cast up 
from the sea after the earthquakes to which the place is 
subject, and sometimes comes in very large masses; it is 
doubtless the consolidated matter from bituminous springs 
below after their fluids have escaped into the sea. The an- 
cients describe the quantity of this floating asphaltura as even 
greater than at the present time. The water of this sea is 
exceedingly nauseous and bitter :^ no living thing can exist 
in it. The specific gravity is 1.1823, so great that the hu- 
man body cannot sink in it. Notwithstanding the large 
quantity of fresh water poured into it by the Jordan, its 



^ Tristram's " Land of Israel." 

2 An analysis by Prof. F. A. Genth of some brought home by Prof. Os- 
born gave — 



Chloride of Sodium 7.5839 

do Calcium 2.8988 

do Magnesium 10.1636 

do Potassium 1.0087 



Bromide of Magnesium 0.5341 

Sulphate of Lime... 0.0901 

Carbonate of Lime 0.0042 



84 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

nauseous qualities remain the same, the evaporation being 
equal to the supply by the river. 

Where is now this shoal part of the sea, nineteen miles in 
length, was formerly land, making, with the low promontory 
yet there, the vale of Siddim ; and here were, in Abram^s 
time, five cities, none of them, however, probably very large. 
The inhabitants were no doubt attracted to the place by the 
warmth of the climate, like that at Jericho, and by the facil- 
ities for irrigation afforded by the streams from the neigh- 
boring mountains on the east; for Robinson remarks, "Even 
at the present day more living streams flow into the Ghor 
[Depression] at the southern end of the sea from the wadys 
of the eastern mountains than are to be found so near to- 
gether in all Palestine ; and the tract, though now mostly 
desert, is still better watered through these streams and by 
many fountains than any other district through the whole 
country." The inhabitants in the extreme heat would find 
a pleasant retreat on the adjoining mountains, made so in- 
viting by these streams, and which were also so well adapted 
to afford pasturage for their flocks. But this vale of Siddim, 
as the Scriptures inform us, was full of slime [literally, bitu- 
men] pits,^ and the soil, as we see, was full of sulphur mixed 
with bitumen ; bitumen was also probably employed, as in 
Mugeyer, for cement in their houses ; and the whole place 
had therefore a most inflammable character. 

Abram and Lot separated on these heights at Bethel. 
Four hundred and thirty years afterward their descendants, 
having become two distinct nations, were to meet east of the 
Dead Sea, and those from Lot were to do the others a griev- 
ous wrong. At i)resent the nephew descended, probably by 
the adjoining wady, Duk, to the plain of Jericho, whence 
he passed on to the vale of Siddim, where he made his resi- 
dence in one of the cities, pasturing his flocks on the sides 
of the adjoining mountains. 

1 Gen. xiv. 10. 



IN PALESTINE. 85 

Abram had, at Bethel, another supernatural manifesta- 
tion, with a direction to look all around him, north, south, 
east and west ; " for all the land which thou seest, to thee 
will I give it, and to thy seed for ever/^ But he was child- 
less. His tent had none of the ringing joyfulness of young 
voices, and he now must have felt doubly his loneliness — 
cut off altogether from kinsmen, — his nephew, the last of 
them, having just removed from him. His was indeed a 
very strange life, invested as it was with such a mysterious 
atmosphere, in which he heard intelligible sounds of prom- 
ise, and through which " dim obscure ^^ he was bid to see 
his posterity, in the far remote future, countless in number 
^' as the dust of the earth.^^ No wonder if he felt in a stu- 
por of wonder and awe and hope — perhaps at times also of 
fear. 

This region at Bethel had now painful associations with 
it, in consequence of the difficulties about the herdsmen and 
the separation ; and he left the place, and went with his 
still large body of retainers again toward the south. 

Twenty-seven miles in that direction was a rich tract of 
table land, which is to this day famous for its beauty and 
fertility, and of which travellers always speak in terms of 
the warmest enthusiasm. It owes its greenness and richness 
of verdure perhaps to the high elevation ; for it is twenty- 
eight hundred feet above the level of the Mediterranean, 
thirty-five miles distant, a view of which it commands, with 
also that of Kerak, a city on the mountain-side east of the 
Dead Sea. The mountains of Edom are also seen as far 
south as Mount Hor. A wady, or broad, shallow valley 
indents the table land from the north, and then, turning 
S.S.E. and deepening and narrowing, makes place for a city 
which existed in Abram^s time, and dated back beyond Zoan, 
or Tanis, in Egypt, the latter now an extent of ruins, while 
this city in Palestine has continued to flourish and to be a 
favorite as in the ancient days. The hills around it are still 



86 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

famous for their grapes and wine, and are the place from 
which the grapes of Eshcol were taken by the spies sent 
by Moses, long after this, to examine the land. 

The city we are speaking of is Hebron, called also Mamre, 
and sometimes Kirjath-arba, from its founder Arba, of the 
race of giants. In the days of Abram, the region was in 
the occupancy of three brothers, Eshcol, Aner and Mamre, 
with whom he entered into friendly relations, as he quietly 
settled down there for a temporary home. It was indeed a 
charming country, where his flocks could find abundance of 
pasturage and water, and where trees of widespread foliage 
offered their shade. These latter were even then considered 
worthy of record,^ and Robinson speaks of one of the same 
species at this place, an oak, by which he encamped, having 
a trunk seven feet in diameter and a circumference of foliage 
of about two hundred and sixty feet. 

But, while living here and enjoying the comforts of his 
new residence and the feeling of quiet after so many remov- 
als, the Hebrew leader was one day startled by news brought 
in great haste from the vale of Siddim, where, as he knew, 
Lot had chosen his residence. 

The events of thirty-eight hundred years ago seem much 
like those of yesterday, as we may see in the second chapter 
of our book, where the present habits and acts of peoj)le in 
those Eastern countries bear close resemblance to what we 
find in the Scriptures ; in both cases, the population made 
up of distinct tribes, with little adhesion to places; and 
those tribes, either singly or combined, making raids on 
other tribes for the pleasure of excitement or for plunder, 
or both, incited to it and rewarded by bardic strains or by 
the eyes of women. The king Chedorlaomer, whose name 
appears to be on the cylinder so recently discovered at Mu- 
geyer, had formerly subdued the princes of the five towns 



' .See Gen. xxvii. 17. 



IN PALESTINE, 87 

in Siddim, and for twelve years they had been subject to his 
rule. Then they rebelled, and a year afterward came that 
monarch with three adjunct kings, plundering the whole 
region from a little south of Damascus down toward Mount 
Hor, a distance of one hundred and eighty miles. The 
rebellious citizens in Siddim would assuredly have fared 
even worse than the others; and their chiefs, in desperation, 
gave battle to the conquerors. But they were defeated; the 
cities were plundered, and Lot and his family were carried 
oflP, destined undoubtedly for slavery. 

This was the startling news brought to Abram on the 
plains of Mamre; and it not only roused him up, but 
efiPected in him, for the time, an entire transformation. He 
who had been fearful in Egypt for his life, was at once 
changed into a hero. He got the three chiefs at Mamre to 
join him ; armed from his own tribe three hundred and 
eighteen warriors ; pursued the invaders as far north as near 
the foot of Hermon ; divided his party so as to make a 
night attack in two separate bands; and in the sudden 
alarm occasioned, and in the darkness, was victorious. The 
flying hosts of invaders were pursued upward toward Da- 
mascus ; and then the victors, collecting the plunder that 
had been carried off, and the captive women and children, — 
Lot and his family among them, — returned toward Mamre. 

The whole history reads as if it might have been in our 
own time; as we have before us the patriarch, like a true 
Arab sheikh, easily fired up ; and him who had lately, in 
Arab style, told a lie through cowardice, now made a hero 
under strong and generous impulse ; also of the straggling 
flight of loosely-cohering people, leaving their plunder as 
they fled ; and lastly the strangely-mixed nature of the 
Hebrew chief, as we still see it in Arab sheikhs ; for Abram, 
who readily accepted gifts from Pharaoh, though they were 
the price of shame and filled with disgraceful remembrances, 
now, on his way back, utterly refused any part of the 



88 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT, 

recaptured goods. All were proffered to him, but with an 
oath seemingly uncalled for (in this too, like an Arab, for 
no people abound so much in oaths as they), he declared to 
one of the rescued kings offering them, " Iwill not take from 
a thread even to a shoe [sandal] latchet. I will not take 
anything that is thine, lest thou shouldest say, I have made 
Abram rich/^ With regard to the booty, he allowed only 
that his three confederates should have their share. 

On his way back he was met at Salem, near what was 
afterward Jerusalem, by Melchizedek, "a priest of the 
most high God/^ who presented to him refreshments and 
gave his blessing, and to whom he offered gifts. There is 
much obscurity about this man, who seems to have been, 
according to the custom of those times, the priest as well as 
the ruler of his people, and who appears to have held to a 
knowledge of the Most High. We shall see, when in 
another chapter we come to look at the religion of the 
Egyptians, that the idea of a Supreme Being was not quite 
lost, though often designedly mixed up with fables and 
purposely hid from the multitudes. It must have been 
cheering to the Hebrew stranger in Canaan to meet such a 
recognition of his faith in this isolated case, and he gave to 
Melchizedek " tithes of all.'' 

He himself returned to his tents at Hebron, and con- 
tinued on in his quiet pastoral life. His circumstances were 
flourishing, his flocks increasing, his own people and his 
neighbors kind ; the late warlike events had given him a 
high position for bravery and energy in action, and for 
sound practical sense. He was respected and loved ; but 
still there was a canker at his heart. He w^as childless. 
Very strange to him, in such a condition of life, sounded all 
those divine assurances of future greatness and wealth to 
his posterity ; for many years had passed over his childless 
home, and he and his wife were already becoming old. The 
strangeness of the mysteries about him made him sensitive 



IN PALESTINE, 89 

and anxious and restless ; the questions put by others re- 
specting his expectations and the divine manifestations must 
still have greatly perplexed him ; he was perplexed even by 
the divine assurances; and now, when another of them 
came to him, " Fear not, Abram ; I am thy shield and thy 
exceeding great reward/^ his perplexity took words and 
spoke out in anxious inquiries. In return he was bid to go 
out of his tent — it was at night — and look up : " Tell the 
stars, if thou be able to number them ; so shall thy seed be/' 
He bowed his head humbly and meekly ; it was the divine 
word ; he believed the Lord ; and it was " counted to him 
for righteousness/' Simple as a child he was, this man, 
just so bold in battle, so manly in his bearing after the vic- 
tory, so strong in all practical sense, yet when God spake 
to him, simple and full of trust. The extreme singleness of 
his life in this matter of trust in God is his high claim to 
greatness, and fully entitles him to the title he still bears 
all over that country, " El Khalil," the friend of God, As 
we look at that singleness, we do not wonder at the distinc- 
tion put upon him by the Deity, who had through him the 
greatest of purposes to accomplish. 

We are to record now an event which may have given 
rise to a custom generally prevalent afterward among the 
Gentiles as well as Jews, or which more probably was in 
accordance with the custom already existing, and which had 
a powerful significance. This custom, as we find it in the 
ancient authors, was, when a covenant was to be made, for 
the contracting parties to procure an animal for sacrifice ; 
to separate it longitudinally exactly into halves ; to place 
them opposite to each other; and for the contracting parties 
to pass between them, either meeting in the middle, and 
there confirming the contract, or doing so immediately after- 
ward. It was the most solemn form of contracting, and 
had significance not only from the shedding of blood, but 
from the cutting in two of the body, as if meaning that the 

8* 



90 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

violator of the contract was to be treated in a similar man- 
ner. It seems to be referred to in Matt. xxiv. 51 ; Luke 
xii. 46; Jer. xxxiv. 18, 19, 20, and in some other passages 
in Scripture. According to Herodotus, Xerxes ordered one 
of the sons of Py theus to be cut in two, and half to be placed 
on each side of the way, that his army might pass between 
them — an act seemingly in consequence of an offer and a 
request made by the father. 

On the present occasion Abram was directed by the divine 
communication to provide certain animals as if for such a 
solemn covenant-making, one that would be open to his out- 
ward perceptions and be a demonstration clear to all his 
senses and clearly impressed upon his mind. He accordingly 
selected a heifer, a goat and a ram, and a dove and pigeon ; 
and dividing all but the fowls into halves, laid them against 
each other. It was an act that would require assistance and 
attract attention, and the circumstances may all indeed have 
been designed to operate on the feelings of questioners 
around him and to be a demonstration to others as well as 
to himself. We can imagine them, standing at a respectful 
distance, earnest, curious, watchful, and filled with awe and 
perhaps fear. He himself remained near the bodies ; and 
'' when the sun was going down, a deep sleep fell upon 
Abram, and lo, a horror of great darkness fell upon him." 
The divine communication now again gave him knowledge of 
the future with reference both to himself and his descendants, 
and also to other nations. Then it is added, ^* And it came 
to pass, that when the sun went down, and it was dark, be- 
hold, a smoking furnace and a burning lamp that passed 
between those pieces," and a covenant was made with him 
by heaven, by which his posterity were to have inheritance 
of those lands. 



IN SOUTHERN PALESTINE. 91 



CHAPTER VIII. 
IN SOUTHERN PALESTINE. 

TROUBLE came into Abram^s tent. We have seen, 
in the second chapter of this work, how under the sys- 
tem of concubinage or secondary wives allowed in that 
country, dissensions almost necessarily arise ; and the beau- 
tiful but arbitrary Amsha there exhibited seems to have 
had a full exemplar in Sarai, Abram^s wife. In the feeling 
of chagrin in the latter at having no children, and her de- 
sire for an heir to Abram, she persuaded him to take her 
servant Hagar, an Egyptian, as concubine, which was done; 
but as soon as her scheme for an heir promised to be suc- 
cessful, a strong jealousy took possession of Sarai's heart. 
This had some apology in the feeling of contempt which the 
Egyptian woman had very soon begun to manifest toward 
her mistress, and the hope doubtless that she would sup- 
plant the latter in the aftections of the master. Soon, the 
mistress, indignant and wrathful, and using language as if 
she thought he was himself to blame, ended a complaint to 
him about her wrongs with the stinging purposed maledic- 
tion, '' The Lord judge between me and thee.^^ He sought 
peace by telling his wife to have her own way on the subject; 
and the consequence was such treatment by the mistress that 
the concubine, in a passion of vexation and rage, fled from 
the tent. 

She wandered ofiF, leaving a dull, heavy, fearful calm be- 
hind ; and particularly the master's heart was saddened at 
the thought that the child that might be born to him would 
be an outcast on the world. Passion gives speed to motion ; 
and the woman, with no wish to linger around such a tent, 
had gone into the wide desert on the south, where in soli- 



92 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

tude she would be able to vent her griefs. She had travelled 
about two days' journey to the southeastward, and had sat 
down by a fountain, yet brooding over her troubles, but with 
her wrath now mollified or dissipated by fatigue and suffer- 
ing ; her dark Egyptian face showing the gloomy feelings 
in her heart. Suddenly she heard her name called, and 
with an impressive adjunctive signifying her true position in 
life. " Hagar, Sarai's maid,'' the voice said, '' whence camest 
thou? and whither wilt thou go?" It was from an angel 
now made evident to her sight ; and after hearing her reply, 
he bade her return and be submissive to her mistress. He 
added that the child who should be born must be called 
Ishmael, God hears, as a remembrance to her and others that 
God had heard her in her affliction ; moreover, that he 
should be a wild man, — ^' his hand against every man and 
every man's hand against him ;" but that he would maintain 
his own against all enemies, and that his descendants would 
be too numerous for computation. 

She returned to her mistress, and her child in due time 
was named according to the direction of the angel. 

From Ishmael have come the Arabs. The record of this 
prophecy here made of them dates back thirty-eight hun- 
dred and thirty-nine years ; and how true the prophecy has 
been, and still continues to be before our own eyes ! " Many 
potentates among the Abyssinians, Persians, Egyptians and 
Turks have endeavored to subjugate the wandering and 
wild Arabs ; but though they have had temporary triumphs, 
they have been ultimately unsuccessful. Sesostris, Cyrus, 
Pompey and Trajan all endeavored to conquer Arabia, but 
in vain. From the beginning to the present day they have 
maintained their independence." 

Thirteen additional years passed over Abram's family, still 
remaining in the fertile region in the neighborhood of He- 
bron. The child had grown into an active lad, making the 
tent more cheerful by his boyish glee, into which, however. 



IN SOUTHERN PALESTINE, 93 

his mother had insinuated some of the spirit from her own 
sufferings, and over all which the jealousy of Sarai kept 
watch, especially as she saw the boy twining himself 
thoroughly among the affections of the father. 

The surroundings of Abram in this country, where he 
stood alone amid the wide sweep of idolatry, — indeed we may 
say alone in the world, in which his single heart had scarcely 
any human aid in its fidelity to God, — made it necessary 
that the heavenly visitations to him should come again and 
again, in order to impress and to strengthen him, and to 
make him feel continuously that he was divinely sustained. 
We must again recall the great difference between his posi- 
tion in the world from that of believers now. Knowledge 
of God was far different then from what it is at present. 
Of general enlightenment there was but little. Men^s rea- 
soning faculties had not the acuteness and the grasp which 
they have reached in these times. There were fewer prem- 
ises from which to start for any right conclusions. Most of 
what to us now is vastly lengthened history, with its mark- 
ings of God^s over-ruling hand, and his punitive or reward- 
ing decisions, was to them an unknown future. Upon their 
past that almighty Power had been indeed most strongly 
and visibly impressed, but the power on the mind even 
from such impressions fades in time, and when transmitted 
only by oral narratives becomes vague and uncertain. 
Egypt, the most highly cultivated nation of that period, was 
grossly idolatrous, in an idolatry which even now confounds 
the intellects of scholars. Canaan was idolatrous. One 
little spot, w^e may say in all the world, remained as a testi- 
mony for God, and only one man in that spot, for we may 
well believe that he had little sympathy in his fidelity either 
within his tent or without. 

God came to him now again with sustaining words. The 
heavenly message was adapted to the time, the man and the 
circumstances in which he was placed. His name, according 



94 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

to the direction, was to be no longer Abram, which means 
''high father ^^^ but Abraham, signifying, as far as we can un- 
derstand it, ''father of a viultitudej' His wife Sarai, " my 
princess/' was to be named Sarah, simply "princess ;'' for the 
promise was now given that in a year she should bear him 
a son, from whom should come nations and kings and many 
people. The old man^s heart, even in the gladness and glory 
of this announcement, turned immediately with the jealousy 
of strong and true affection toward the stripling in his tent ; 
as if frightened, lest, in the glory of the promised heir, the 
other should be quite lost ; and he exclaimed, " Oh that Ish- 
mael might live before thee V' He was reassured, by pro- 
mises that twelve princes and a great nation should proceed 
from Ishmael. 

In this visitation a rite symbolical of purity of heart^ 
was enjoined upon him and every male in his family, to be 
observed as a continued token of the covenant between hea- 
ven and himself and his descendants. The injunction was 
obeyed, and the rite has continued to be one of the charac- 
teristics of the Arabs and Jews to the present time. 

Soon after this, as he was sitting one day, during the heat 
of noontide, at the opening of his tent, he saw three 
strangers approaching. Immediately, in a manner as if it 
might indeed be an Arab's invitation to hospitality of the 
present day, he rose and urged them to enter and partake of 
refreshments. They did so, and the entertainment following 
seems as if it might have been but yesterday, so clearly is 
the scene defined before us, and so greatly resembling what 
a traveller may now witness on similar occasions in that 
land. He " hastened into the tent unto Sarah, and said, 
Make ready quickly three measures of fine meal, and knead 
it and bake cakes upon the hearth. And Abraham ran unto 
the herd and fetched a calf, and gave it unto a young man ; 

1 See in connection with Gen. xvii., also Deut. xxx. 6 ; Jer. iv. 4 ; Rom. 
iv. 11 ; Col. u. 11. 



IN SOUTHERN PALESTINE. 95 

and he hastened to dress it. And he took butter and milk/ 
and the calf which he had dressed and set it before them ; 
and he stood by them under the tree, and they did eat.'^ 
They were three heavenly visitants, and they repeated now 
the promise of an heir by Sarah his wife. As they were 
departing he accompanied them part of the way, which was 
toward the east; and they revealed to him the purpose of 
heaven to destroy the cities where Lot was staying, in con- 
sequence of \\i% abominable wickedness of their inhabitants. 
He pleaded that the righteous would in that case perish with 
the wicked ; and was finally promised that if only ten right- 
eous men could be found there, the cities should be spared 
for their sakes. So the angels proceeded on their way. 

But there were not even that redeeming number. On the 
morrow, as at a very early hour he stood by his tent and 
looked eastward, he saw a dense smoke rise up and over- 
cloud all the heavens : the cities were consumed except a 
small one called Zoar, for which Lot had interceded as a 
place of refuge for himself and family. The ground in this 
region, as already noticed, was full of pits of bitumen, which, 
aided by fire from heaven and sulphurous vapor, consumed 
all but the one city. This appears to have stood on the 
promontory which now juts out at the southeast side of the 
Dead Sea, and where foundations of buildings are still said 
to exist. This terrible catastrophe was no doubt a miracu- 
lous visitation as a punishment for the sins of these people ; 
but was probably aided by natural means, which may have 
been an earthquake, such as has lately shattered Tiberias and 
quite destroyed Safed, two cities not far north of this ; and 
also by the bitumen and sulphur for which this spot is still 
remarkable, as already described. The shoal part, nineteen 
miles long, at the southern end of the sea, doubtless shows 
where the four destroyed cities stood. 

^ The Hebrew says 3Sn> Halab, doubtless the leaven or sour curds, as we 
see now in constant use among the Arabs and Turks. 



96 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT, 

Lot and his two daughters, through the guidance of the 
angels, escaped to Zoar. His wife " looked back from be- 
hind him, and she became a pillar of salt :^^ the hill of salt, 
still existing there, bears witness to this catastrophe. 

Abraham himself soon after this moved his tents and 
flocks from Hebron to a region farther to the west. A dis- 
trict of country lying along the Mediterranean and extend- 
ing some distance inland, was occupied by the Philistines, 
doubtless an offshoot of the Pali or Shepherd-race w^hich 
we have already noticed as occupying Egypt after their 
migration from the distant East. Abimelech was sheikh 
or king of the Philistines, and had his chief residence at 
Gerar, near to where Gaza is at present, from which his 
tribe were scattered about as their flocks had need of pas- 
turage. South of them was the sandy region, extending to 
the borders of Egypt. Abraham and Abimelech were on 
friendly terms, but the former, for the same reason as in 
Egyj)t, repeated the mean wickedness that he had been 
guilty of in that country, and lied to Abimelech respecting 
his wife Sarah, declaring that she was his sister. The result 
was the same as in the former case : the woman was pro- 
tected by heavenly interference most undeserved, as respects 
both herself and husband. Abimelech, on learning the con- 
nexion between the two, upbraided him with his deception ; 
to which he gave the same lame response as before, that she 
w^as his half-sister as well as w^ife. The king of Gerar pre- 
sented him with sheep and oxen and servants, and a thou- 
sand pieces of silver, and said to Sarah, respecting her hus- 
band : " Behold he is to thee a covering of the eyes unto 
all that arc with thee, and with all other: thus she was 
reproved." 



AN HEIR GIVEN, 97 



CHAPTER IX. 

AN HEIR GIVEN. 

" T AUGHTER V That was the meaning of the word 
-" Isaac, the name given by heavenly direction to the 
child which Sarah, soon after the above event, presented to 
Abraham. Her own son ! and as the two parents contem- 
plated the heir so long hoped for, and now the child of their 
old age, what visions of future brightness and glory must 
have risen before their minds in consequence of the many 
promises from God with which it had been heralded. Both 
father and mother had laughed inwardly in glee when the 
announcement of such a coming event had been made to 
them ; and now the mother exclaimed, " God hath made 
me to laugh, so that all that hear will laugh with me." 
The child was therefore rightly named Isaac, '' Laughter ;^^ 
and a brightness of joy was diffused throughout the tent and 
amid the numerous retainers of the aged chief. There was 
only one drawback to it all, and that was from the jealousy 
and envy of Hagar and her boy, who was now fourteen 
years of age. He was an active lad, with glittering eyes such 
as belong to his country, the great pet of his mother, and 
heretofore of his father also ; but he now saw himself sud- 
denly supplanted both in affections and in material expecta- 
tions by the new heir. The mother would feel it more 
keenly than he would in the frank, open nature of boyhood. 
Doubtless, however, she instilled into him her jealousy and 
envy ; and doubtless also the mutual spleen which he had 
often witnessed between mistress and the servant-woman, 
his mother, had sharpened his observation and sensibilities. 
When the new heir was weaned, there was a great feast, 
with rejoicings both in the tent and among the retainers 



98 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT, 

without. But two hearts did not share in it ; and of these 
two, the little Ishmael in his undisguisedness of youth made 
demonstration of his feelings by mockings and ridicule. 

Severely were both child and mother punished for this. 
The mocking fell under the observation of Sarah, — perhaps 
was intended for her notice ; and all her motherly indigna- 
tion was fired at the sight. She came to her husband with 
the cry, 

" Cast out this bond-woman, and her son ; for the son of 
^:his bond-woman shall not be heir with my son, even with 
Isaac.^^ 

There was a painful domestic scene in that tent; the father's 
heart clinging with great fondness to the little boy, his first- 
born; Sarah passionately persistent; Hagar full of indigna- 
tion and unavailing grief; the new infant looking with wide, 
wondering eyes on a tumult of which he was the innocent 
cause ; the lad, frightened at the storm he had raised, but 
resolute for his mother, and turning appealing looks toward 
his father. Abraham was relieved from his dilemma by a 
heavenly warning, which announced to him that the lad 
was, and would continue to be, under divine protection ; and 
that a nation would come from him, for his father's sake ; 
but that it would now be best to separate the women and 
their sons. 

On the morrow in the early light, the father sent Hagar 
and Ishmael away, after having given them provision of 
bread and water for their immediate necessities. There 
seems to have been a heartlessness in the act, which was so 
different from his former general strength of affection and 
deep interest in the lad, even when the new child was pro- 
mised ; and we can account for his conduct only by the irri- 
tations within the tent, and the rancorous haste of his wife 
to liave both persons out of her sight. Tie knew also that 
God had pronounced a blessing on Ishmael, and had pro- 
mised to "multiply him exceedingly and make him a great 



AN HEIR GIVEN, 99 

nation;'^ and he believed therefore that they would be 
watched over and preserved. 

His own residence was now at Beersheba, the place 
described in our first chapter, to which he had removed from 
Gerar, and where he had, by digging wells, secured a good 
supply of water for his flocks. 

Hagar and her son wandered down southwardly toward 
the desert. Perhaps she hoped to be able to reach Egypt ; 
more probably she went on in the sullen doggedness of pas- 
sion deepening more and more into despair. The country, 
as she travelled on, soon began to change into the dreari- 
ness of those great stretches of baked earth and gravel form- 
ing the desert. It suited well to her abandonment and utter 
dreariness of feeling ; herself and son outcasts, she felt a 
hatred for the world and all its brighter aspects. The 
region here was dreary enough, for they were leaving all 
signs of verdure behind, except the retem' bushes, a species 
of Scotch broom, which here and there dot the desert, and 
when the sun's rays come more slantingly afford some shade 
on the oven-like wastes. The water in their skin-bottle 
became exhausted ; and as she wandered on she saw no signs 
of wells for a further supply. '' Return V^ — was that her 
son asking her to return ! What! to that tent of rejoicing 
for her son's rival, and the place of her own shame and hu- 
miliation? Better, she probably thought, that they both 
should perish here in the wilderness, where no triumphant 



1 Robinson, speaking of the shrubs of the desert, says : " One, the prin- 
cipal of them, is Retenij a species of the broom-plant. Genista ractam of 
Forsake. This is the largest and most conspicuous shrub of these deserts, 
growing thickly in water-courses and valleys. Our Arabs always selected 
the place of their encampment (if possible) in a spot where it grew, in 
order to be sheltered at night from the wind ; and during the day, when 
they often went in advance of the camels, we found them not unfrequently 
-Bitting or sleeping under a bush of retem, to protect them from the sun. It 
was in this very desert, a day's journey from Beersheba, that the prophet 
Elijah lay down and slept beneath the same bush." 



lOO LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

eyes, as of her mistress, or no pitying looks as from the 
menials, should Avitness the last scenes ! 

The two wandered on, they hardly knew whither, or why 
they went, except that in motion there seemed to be relief to 
angry feeling. But exhaustion came, and also a terrible 
thirst. When Hagar had once before been sent off in a 
similar manner, she was alone, and her passion could sustain 
her better. Now, the appealing eyes of her loved boy were 
on her ; his complaints stung her anger now into greater 
force of pain ; his moanings filled her with wretchedness ; 
but she still dragged herself and him along, passion giving 
her strength, which it failed to do in him. Still on, now 
with words of rage toward those left behind, now w^ith 
words of encouragement and kindness, and perhaps of pas- 
sion toward him, till at last that hot, burning sun dried up 
his strength, and he sank exhausted and gasping and ask- 
ing faintly for drink. There was none to give. She be- 
lieved he must die — both probably must die; probably she 
wished it quickly for both. She laid him in such shade as 
a retena bush could give, and went off " a good way, as it 
were a bow-shot ; for she said, Let me not see the death of 
the child. And she sat over against him, and lifted up her 
voice, and wept.^^ Wrath had broken down. Affection 
alone had rule at last, and sobs and tears came to her relief. 

Help was nearer than she had imagined. In that coun- 
try the wells have sometimes no marks by* which they can 
be distinguished, and one such was now not far off, but 
hitherto unseen by hcr.^ A heavenly voice was heard in 

1 Van de Velde, in describing his late journey over this very region says, 
" We were among the wells of Ar'-tlrah before we were aware of it. No 
stone walls or other masonry surrounds them, and nobody is aware of 

them until they are seen close at hand The wells of Beersheba too 

are just as little visible at a distance as those of Ar^-arah. I can now fully 
understand how Hagar, when her child seemed likely to die of thirst, 
found herself near such a well, without being aware of it until the Lord 
opened her eyes and enabled her to see it." 



AN HEIR GIVEN. lOI 

her extremity, directing her attention to it, and encouraging 
her with the promise that the lad should become the pro- 
genitor of a great nation. She felt the strength of the sus- 
taining power ; she was not alone now, and an outcast and 
abandoned, for Abraham's God had promised her help. So 
she and the lad lived and prospered as much as could be in 
the district of Arabia, which they finally reached. He 
" became an archer ;'' his mother in due time procured for 
him a wife from Egypt, and from him have sprung that sin- 
gular Arab race, whose '^ hand is against every man, and 
every man's hand against them.'' 

Abraham felt that this present home at the southern end 
of the pastoral region in Canaan, about thirty miles nearly 
southwest from Hebron, was w^ell adapted to his unique con- 
dition in that country, where he and his people were to be 
an isolated race, distinct from all others in the land ; and 
he prepared accordingly to make this his more permanent 
home. He planted here a grove, not probably of the oak 
or terebinth, which are not found as far south as this, but 
of the tamarisk, a tree of moderate size with feather-like, 
graceful branches ; and here also he proceeded to have the 
wells dug w^hich, through the long series of years to this 
day, have continued to assuage the thirst of the flocks in 
these extensive pasture-grounds. They have been a far 
better memorial respecting him than if he had piled up a 
mountain for his monument, greater even than the pyramids 
of Egypt, the wonder of the world. A dispute arising here 
connected with one of these wells, and threatening to make 
a disruption between him and Abimelech, he and the king, 
together with Phichol, chief of the host of the latter, both 
of whom had come to visit him, entered into a covenant of 
harmony and friendship, which they confirmed by mutual 
oaths. The place took from this incident its name, Beer- 
sheba, the well of the oath. Abimelech had said to him, 

some time previously, "Behold, my land is before thee; 
9* 



I02 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

dwell where it pleaseth thee/^ So this became his 
home. 

We may presume that here also he built an altar, proba- 
bly by his grove ; and he '' called there on the name of the 
Lord, the everlasting God/^ 



CHAPTER X. 
THE TRIAL OF FAITH, 

WE return now to the scene depicted in the first chapter 
of this book ; for the reader will notice that we have, 
in the intervening remarks, been reviewing the history of 
Abraham from his departure from Ur down to that period 
of time. 

He had got to be an old man, even according to the reck- 
oning of age in those early histories of our race. He had 
now advanced by several years beyond the age of one hun- 
dred, but was yet a hale, vigorous man ; and we may picture 
him like one of the present sheikhs of that country, erect, 
of grave but benign aspect, gray-haired and venerable in 
ap2)earance ; to which we may doubtless add a strange, 
querying expression in his eye, as he gazed on that evening 
scene at Becrsheba. His face did not show that full com- 
placency which the view before him was adapted to pro- 
duce; for this view took in vast herds and flocks, all his 
own, gathering now from the rich pastures for their even- 
ing refreshment at the wells. From far off they came, some 
rising over the distant low hills, some dotting the sides of 
the varied undulations or scattered over the widespread 
plains; while the setting sun was throwing its brightness 
on every object and filling all the air with amethystine hues. 
Amid this was heard the lowing of cattle, the bleating of 



THE TRIAL OF FAITH. 103 

sheep, the shouts of herdsmen, the merriment of gay hearts 
among the hundreds of retainers gathering now for the so- 
cial evening enjoyment and full of gladness and jokes at the 
reunions. Camels were lifting their long necks above all 
other gathering groups and looking in grave, sober dignity 
over the moving panorama ; and the young camel progeny 
could afford amusement by their very grave sobriety of man- 
ners, in which no attempt at liveliness or play is ever known. 
Such was the scene on this evening about the several wells 
at Beersheba, and on which the old man was gazing with a 
pleased, and yet half-troubled eye. For his thoughts went, 
very often, after that cast-off son, his first-born and much- 
loved, from whom he had parted so unwillingly, and who 
had been lost to his sight amid those distant southern 
stretches of the desert. The second-born and heir was now 
here before him, the darling of the mother's satisfied heart, 
and well-beloved also of the father, as he truly might be ; 
for the young man, Isaac (^^ Laughter'^), was gentle, amiable 
in disposition, lacking in the activity and hardihood of cha- 
racter in Ishmael, but yet winning, obedient in every duty, 
and well adapted, if not to force admiration, yet to produce 
toward him from all an earnest and tender love. The fath- 
er's eyes, therefore, amid the troubled thoughts that came 
trooping to him from that far southern desert, and amid 
which he could find no consolation of manliness and firm- 
ness in himself, rested for comfort on Isaac and on the future 
which was covenanted from heaven for this second son. A 
great nation was to come from him — such had the heavenly 
promise been — descendants were to be in number like the 
stars or like the dust of the earth ; and through him were 
all the families of the earth to be blessed. 

Abraham felt that his life had been a very strange one. 
He had not from the first been like other men ; for amid the 
heathenish associations and surroundings at Ur, he had 
looked directly up to God with a pure, clear eye. He knew 



I04 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

that God had in return come nearer to him than to other 
men, and he felt the full glory and the full power of the 
covenant between God and himself. He knew too that he 
had been set apart in the world for mysterious, — he did not 
doubt, for good and glorious, purposes. In his many weak- 
nesses, in his perplexities from long delay in the fulfilment 
of heavenly promises, in his troubles at home, where his 
heart found little support in duty but rather embarrass- 
ments and vexations, he still kept himself unmixed with 
idolatry and untainted. In Ur, in Egypt, at Hebron, his 
heart in this one thing was sound. This soundness had not 
always kept him from the want of integrity in life and even 
at times from baseness ; yet still he had that great merit that 
he looked directly up to God, saw Him with a clear eye, 
called directly to Him, felt assured that He was always by. 
And although in his extremity when before Pharaoh and 
Abimelech, he ought to have known that God would pro- 
tect hii but felt his faith there give way, still his faith 
always rallied again and was true to itself and to God. In 
judging also of his sins, which no one can think of without 
sternest condemnation toward him, and which the Bible 
history gives with simple clearness of narrative, we are to 
consider the world all around him, what were its sins and 
its codes of morals, and how a man would be insensibly 
influenced by these. Truth undoubtedly is always the 
same, and righteousness always the same, and our obligations 
to both are unswerving; but our judgment of the heinous- 
ness of a man's swerving from either must be modified by 
the circumstances of his education, the influences of society 
around hini, and the nature of moral sentiment in that 
society. We are to form our estimate therefore of the wick- 
edness sometimes seen in the lives of persons put forward 
even in Scripture as generally worthy men, not by our codes 
purified by eighteen centuries of Christianity, but in part 
by the codes and sentiments of all the world at the times in 



THE TRIAL OF FAITH, 105 

which they lived. It is not only Christian charity, but 
also strict justice, to judge them by the times in which they 
lived, not by our times. No charity or justice, however, 
though it may modify our condemnation, can make sin 
otherwise than it actually is, simply and truly sin. 

No logical difficulties now troubled the mind of Abraham 
as he looked on his son that evening. His thoughts kept 
centering upon the vast promises made by Jehovah respect- 
ing him, — the covenants made, the glory that was to come 
through him, the blessedness to all the earth. Isaac was to 
him, apart from fatherly affection, an intensely interesting 
object, a being marked by heaven, and designated as one by 
whom God was to give his highest favors to the world. No 
wonder that Abraham loved and doted on that son ! 

With what amazement, then, did this patriarch, just after 
the scene detailed, hear a command given from heaven, 

" Take now thy son^ thine only son Isaac , whom thou lovest, 
and get thee into the land of Moriah ; and offer him there 
FOR A BURNT-OFFERING upon One of the mountains which I 
will tell thee ofJ^ 

The first supposition that might occur now to our minds 
would be that Abraham could not believe such a communica- 
tion to be heavenly ; and that all his feelings would revolt 
against the demand as a thing incongruous with the deal- 
ing of a good Creator toward his creatures, and therefore 
impossible to come from God. This leads us to revert to 
the idea suggested above, that we must judge those ancient 
people by the times in which they lived, and not by our own. 

Human sacrifices, as a choice offering to their gods, pre- 
vailed in the countries adjoining Abraham's residence; and, 
" Down to the times of Manetho and Plutarch,^^ says Bun- 
sen, " and certainly to the fall of paganism in Egypt, the 
sacrificial stamp remained a speaking proof of the original 
sin-offering in Egypt also having been human sacrifice, which 



lo6 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

is indeed implied in the primary idea of sacrifice. It repre- 
sented a man on his knees, with his hands tied behind him 
and the sacrificial knife pointed at his throat.'^ " Manetho 
related/^ says Plutarch, '' that in Eilthyia (the city of the 
mother of Isis) the sacrifice of the so-called Typhoneans was 
performed during the dog-days, — human sacrifices, namely, 
when the ashes of the victims were scattered to the winds. 
This account is derived from Manetho's work on ^ Archaeo- 
logy and Devotion.' Porphyry quotes this same work to 
the following effect : * Amos [Aahmes, according to Bunsen, 
the first Pharaoh of the new or restored Egyptian empire, 
and after Abraham's time] abolished the practice of human 
sacrifices in Heliopolis [On of our Scriptures]. They 
were formerly performed to Hera (the mother of Isis). The 
victims were examined and a seal was affixed to them, just 
as the calves without blemish are now examined and sealed. 
Three were sacrificed daily.'' The celebrated Egyptologist, 
Wilkinson, has recently discovered on the monuments a 
stamp answering exactly to the description of Manetho, 
and has given a copy of it in the fifth volume of his " Man- 
ners and Customs of the Egyptians." ^ 

" It was a custom among the Phoenicians and Canaanites," 
says another excellent authority, ''\n times of great calamity, 
for their kings to sacrifice one of their sons, whom they loved 
best ; and it was common both with them, as well as with 
the Moabites and Ammonites, to sacrifice their children. . . . 
Upon extraordinary occasions, multitudes were sacrificed at 
once to their sanguinary deities. Thus, during the battle 
between the Sicilian army under Gelon, and the Carthagin- 
ians [a Phoenician colony] under Amilcar in Sicily, the lat- 
ter remained in his camp offering sacrifices to the deities of 
his country, and consuming, upon one large pile, the bodies 
of numerous victims. (Herod, lib. vii. c. 167.) When Aga- 



* See Bunsen*8 " Eg>T)t^8 Place in History." 



THE TRIAL OF FAITH. 107 

thocles was about to besiege Carthage, its inhabitants, seeing 
the extremity to which they were reduced, imputed all their 
misfortunes to the anger of Saturn ; because, instead of offer- 
ing up children of noble descent (who were usually sacri- 
ficed), there had been fraudulently substituted for them the 
children of slaves and foreigners. Two hundred children 
of the best families in Carthage were therefore immolated 
to propitiate the offended divinity, to whom upward of three 
hundred citizens voluntarily sacrificed themselves from a 
sense of their guilt of this pretended crime/^^ The chief 
oracles among the heathen, as that at Delphi, at Dodona, 
and that of Jupiter Saotes, also directed human sacrifices to 
be offered. 

Abraham prepared to obey the command. Whatever 
were his feelings toward Isaac himself, the terrible influ- 
ences around him, and the systems of belief and practice in 
Egypt and Phoenicia and Canaan — where it was considered 
that the more precious the child the more acceptable to the 
divinity was the offering— kept him from revolting from the 
command or questioning its origin on account of its terrible 
nature ; and he yielded. Nor would the young man, under 
such universal teachings around them, rebel and refuse sub- 
mission ; for his gentleness of disposition would lead him 
readily to acquiesce in the belief that he and his father 
w^ould thus be paying the highest possible honor to God. 
Our own views of the Jehovah are certainly far different, 
and our training has been different ; but we must remember 
that Abraham was only catching glimpses of the Deity by 
present revelations ; that he was alone amid the dark over- 
cloudings of heathendom all around, without a human being 
to go to for counsel or instruction, and that he could do no 
more than listen to promptings which had mysteriously led 



^ See Home's Introduction to the Critical Study and Knowledge of the 
Holy Scriptures. 



lo8 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

him on. To them he had always yielded implicit obedience 
with fulness of unquestioning faith. 

He prepared now to obey, his faith not giving way, but 
his heart torn into shreds and bleeding at every pore. For 
he loved the young man with such an entireness of love as 
could exist only where there was no other heart's treasure 
in the world. His w^ife he had known to be querulous, 
sometimes despotic, always jealous; but the son was one 
upon w^hom all his affections could be lavished without 
check, and who could return them without stint from any 
countervailing influences. The other son was gone: the 
father could never think of that one without a feeling of 
self-abasement from his own yieldingness, and also of but 
half-stifled anger against his jealous wife ; but here there 
was no drawback, and the grievances from conjugal occur- 
rences made his love — which we know from other things to 
have been capable of great strength — all centre with addi- 
tional power on this, the son of his old age, the heaven- 
heralded child, about whom such future w^onderful glory 
had been promised. His affections had been allowed to 
have, and they had, full concentration on his beloved Isaac. 

God, it w^as true, could give another, as he had given this 
one : there Abraham's faith did not waver ; but yet !— to 
remove Isaac \vould be to make the w^hole world to him a 
blank, a terrible, dark abyss. 

But he set about obeying the command. 

The Scriptures tell us that *^God did tempt Abraham ;" 
but a more correct translation would have been, he " proved " 
him, " put him fo the test;"* not that the omniscient Jeho- 
vah needed any proof for himself, but because the example 
was needed for the world. And so this has been, ever since. 



* As in 1 Sam. xvii. 39, where, twice, the same Hebrew word as in this 
instince nieaim tried or proved ; and in Job iv. 2, literally, " If any one try 
a word with thee." 



THE TRIAL OF FAITH. 109 

to the world, an example of pure, unliesitating, unquestioning 
faith. 

Though the faith was such, still the trial was a terrible 
one ; and every item of the preparation, — the cleaving of 
the wood for the offering, the arrangements for the fire to 
be kept up on the way, the knife for the sacrifice, — all was 
like a sword piercing the father's heart. Questions also by 
the mother, or by the young man himself, were to be evaded 
or ambiguously answered, leaving the eyes of the questioners 
still expressing doubt or dissatisfaction, and making the 
weight of the secret in the old man's heart — a guilty secret, 
it seemed to be—almost intolerable to be borne alone. But 
he bore it alone, and in silence, as far as possible; and then 
putting the wood on an ass, and with two servants and his 
son in company, he set out on his journey. '' What an- 
swer," he thought, "must he give to the mother on his 
return?'' He was to be informed by divine admonition 
respecting the place intended for the sacrifice, and was led 
onward from Beersheba in a northerly direction, past He- 
bron with its old associations, and where, if there were now 
greetings from old acquaintances, he could have no heart to 
reply ; past where afterward grew up Bethlehem, at which, 
centuries afterward, was to appear in human form the great 
self-sacrifice for the sins of the whole world, of which, in- 
deed, Abraham's intended act was faintly typical ; and 
now, probably somewhere about this place, looking for- 
ward, he saw^ the mountain, Moriah, where his own altar 
for the purposed sacrifice of his son was to be built.^ They 
travelled slowly, for the distance from Beersheba to Mount 



^ A recent traveller has designated the place near this whence Moriah 
may be seen, " afar ofil" 

2 Dean Stanley supposes that Mt. Gerizim was the place selected for the 
sacrifice ; but, if there were no other objection, the distance from Beersheba 
to this*mountain (seventy-five miles) would be a sufl&cient argument against 
such an h\ [jothesis. 
10 



no LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT, 

Morlah is only forty-two miles, and they did not arrive there 
till the third day ; but, indeed, the aged man had no incli- 
nation for a rapid journey. Perhaps he faintly hoped for 
some interposition or some countermand from heaven on the 
way — probably looked around anxiously, as he went, for 
some angel-form to appear to him, as was done when, in his 
tent, the announcement of Isaac^s approaching birth was 
made. No doubt he listened nervously at night for the 
well-known heavenly voice, till expectation, and at last all 
hope, had become extinct. There was the mountain : he 
must proceed to it : there was to be the end ! Yet through 
all this journey, and with all these lacerated feelings — even 
hope extinguished — faith was firm and true. He looked up 
to God with a clear, undoubting eye. The belief prevalent 
among those nations that the sacrifice most acceptable to 
their deity was that which was nearest and most precious to 
the person offering it, strengthened his sentiment of obedi- 
ence now, as he went on toward an act from which all natural 
feeling and all affection recoiled as horrible. What a tem- 
pest there was in his heart ! But faith was strongest even 
now. 

He directed the servants, at a proper time, to remain be- 
hind with the ass; and placing the fuel on the young man, 
and taking the fire and knife, he left them and proceeded 
with his son to the mountain. 

" My father,'^ said the young man, as they went, *^ behold 
the fire and the wood ; but where is the lamb for a burnt- 
olForing?'^ He answered, 

" My son, God will provide himself a lamb for a burnt- 
ofTering." 

On the mountain the altar was built, and the wood was 
laid upon it ; then the secret of the intended sacrifice was 
all revealed to the young man ! But there was no resistance 
on his part. The belief prevalent in the country had no 
doubt taken hold of liini also; and he felt, in addition to 



THE TRIAL OF FAITH. Ill 

that, the faith which was so strong in the father. He saw 
and knew all the anguish in the father's heart, and that the 
sacrifice in that heart would be a more frightful thing than 
that of his own life would be to himself. He was bound 
and laid on the altar, upon the wood. *^And Abraham 
stretched forth his hand, and took the knife to slay his son.'^ 

But an angel interposed. A voice from heaven ordered 
him to stay the knife and directed his attention to a ram 
caught in a thicket near by ; and this was offered on the 
altar as a burnt-sacrifice. 

We now, after a lapse of thirty-eight hundred years, gaze 
back at that faith so clear and unsullied in the old man's 
anguished heart. Many millions since that time have gazed 
back at it. It is a wonderful spectacle that may well make 
us strong, as it has made myriads since that day strong, in 
faithful obedience to God. We think of the wild hurricane 
of feeling in the father's heart ; of the anguish in all his 
lacerated being ; of his persistence in duty ; and then of the 
crushing weight lifted suddenly off, and of the thrill of joy 
in the relief; and the Christian beholds in all the touching 
scene a typical presentation of a greater Sacrifice voluntarily 
chosen, where was no relief ; Christ offered, and the 

SACRIFICE MADE ! 

By this altar, where Abraham stood on Moriah, promises 
were given to him, renewed from former occasions, but now 
with greater form and solemnity : " By myself have I 
sworn, saith the Lord ;" and then the words declare that 
blessings should flow upon him and his posterity. Among 
the promises was one most precious, as it was widest in ex- 
tent, of all : " In thy seed shall all the nations of the earth 
be blessed." The promise has been fulfilled, and in a Sacri- 
fice where the Victim was not spared. 

Death, however, came not many years after this^ to make 



^ Josephus says twelve years. 



112 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT, 

really desolate the tent of Abraham. In his migratory, 
pastoral life he had removed again to the neighborhood of 
Hebron ; and there he saw life ebb and pass away from her 
who had for so long a time been his faithful wife and true 
friend. Sarah was one hundred and twenty-seven years old 
when she died. She had been his wife for more than sixty- 
two years, and had accompanied him in sincere and unshaken 
affection, first from her ancient home and kindred, and then 
in his varied changes of place; at times even too obedient 
to his wishes and too careful of his well-being and his life. 
Her jealousy came from the very strength of her affections ; 
and its manifestations were entirely in accordance with cus- 
toms such as we see still prevailing among those Eastern 
people. She must have possessed remarkable beauty, even to 
an advanced age. She appears to have presided well over 
the domestic affairs, and was a good companion, good mother, 
and a faithful wife. 

Abraham, after he had mourned for her according to the 
forms of the country, and in a depth of grief which no out- 
ward forms can ever reach, presented himself before the 
rulers of Kirjath-arba (Hebron) and asked, for her remains, 
a burial-place which he had selected adjoining to their city, 
and probably by the spot where he and she had often resided 
in their " tent-house.'^ In a grove in front of Hebron was 
a cave, seemingly a double cave, if we may judge from its 
name, Machpelah (a doubling, from KapJial, to double)^ and 
also from the results of explorations recently made. Proba- 
bly there were two partly separated by a natural wall. To 
his request the rulers answered, " Hear us, my lord ; thou art 
a mighty i)rince among us; in the choice of our sepulchres 
bury thy dead ; none of us shall withhold from thee his 
sepulchre, but that thou mayest bury thy dead." He re- 
quested tliera to intercede with Ephron, the owner of the 
cave, for the sale of it and a portion of the ground ; but the 
latter offered it as a gift. There is a singular beauty in the 



THE TRIAL OF FAITH, 1 13 

courtesies of these people on this occasion, when the grief- 
stricken old man came before them at the gate of their city, 
— the usual place for public official transactions; — and also 
in the dignity of Abraham, with his heart set on having a 
resting-place for the dead so near his own home, but still, 
in his deep sorrow, observing the courtly forms of the peo- 
ple of that country : ^^And Abraham bowed himself before 
the people of the land. And he spake unto Ephron in the 
audience of the people of the land, saying. But if thou wilt 
give it, I pray thee hear me ; I will give thee money for the 
field ; take it of me, and I will bury my dead there/^ 
Ephron answered, '' My lord, hearken unto me; the land is 
worth four hundred shekels of silver ;^ what is that betwixt 
me and thee ? bury therefore thy dead/^ 

The place was purchased, and " the field of Ephron, 
which was in Machpelah, which was before Mamre, the 
field and the cave which was therein, and all the trees that 
were in the field, that were in all the borders round about, 
were made sure unto Abraham for a possession in the pre- 
sence of all the children of Heth, before all that went in at 
the gate of the city/^ 

This spot, still capable of being identified beyond any 
doubt, is now enclosed within a high wall carefully guarded 
by the Mohammedan possessors against all intrusion by 
either Jew or Christian. It will be noticed more at length 
in a future part of this work. 



^ Estimated to be equal to about $250 of our money. 
10* 



114 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 



CHAPTER XI. 
HOW ALPHABETS WERE ORIGINALLY MADE. 

THE statement that the field of Ephron and the cave of 
Machpelah '' were made sure unto Abraham for a pos- 
session^^ seems to convey the idea of a written contract, and 
brings us to a most interesting query respecting writing in 
those times. That subject, if investigated, will show the 
reader the origin of the very printed letters which are now 
meeting his eye in this book, and their close connection with 
such writing as that to which Abraham probably there put 
his name ; and will moreover put before us the progressive 
action of the human mind in one of the most difficult of all 
undertakings, — that of making objects presented to the eye 
combine in intelligible forms addressed to the ear. The 
matter on which we are now entering must also be under- 
stood in order to a full comprehension of affairs in Egypt, 
soon to come before us. So we enter upon it here. 

The first effort among any people to convey ideas by de- 
lineations would be such as we still see on our Indian lodges, 
where rude drawings of the human figure, and also arbitrary 
marks, answer the purpose sufficiently to a certain extent. 
But only to a very small extent ; and when definite or 
minute information is needed, these must fail. If it was 
desirable, for instance, to state that Menes built Hara,^ al- 



^ Hara, the On of Gen. xli. 45, 50, and xlvi. 20, and tlie Hdiopolis of the 
Greeks, was the most sacred city of Egypt, and is believed to have been 
built by Menes, the first of the Egyptian kings. The commencement of 
his dynasty is variously estimated by Egyptologists, Poole placing it at 
2700, Bunsen at 3643, and Lepsius 3793 B. C. ; the latter two doubtless 
misled by supposing certain Egyptian dynasties consecutive, which were 
in reality contemporaneous in different parts of the country. 



HOW ALPHABETS WERE ORIGINALLY MADE, 115 

though the figure of a man with an attached mark of royalty 
and a city might be drawn, this would leave it doubtful 
who is the king, what the city, and what is the connection 
between the two. Something more definite is needed ; and 
now commences an exceedingly interesting effort of the 
human mind, which we are quite able to trace; and to 
enable us to bring it more clearly to our comprehension, we 
will suppose the effort to be made now with our language, 
just as we know it to have been done in a different language 
in those remote times. We will suppose that no alphabet at 
all now existed, nothing but such indefinite pictures as are 
presented above ; and that we wish in English to make the 
definite statement, Menes built Hara, 

On considering these spoken words, we find that the first 
part of the sound in Menes is common also to mouse, mouth, 
mooUy mill, and various other words. Now, if any one or 
all of these easily recognized objects be pictured with the 
general understanding that only the initial sound in it is to 
be taken, we have the sound M brought to the ear by our 
eyes, and have taken an important step in getting the 
name of the individual. The next sound is E; and if we 
picture an ear, eagle, eel with the same idea in the mind of 
all observers, that the initial sound is what is intended, we 
have gained another sound conveyed by the eye to the ear; 
and with the former, M, united to it, we have Me. So again 
nose, or net, nail, 7ioose, pictured, will, with the same under- 
standing, give us a representation for the sound N] E can be 
procured as before ; and S is afforded by the initial sound in 
sea, sack, sail, serpent, sun. Consequently the previous under- 
standing being general that the object pictured is to represent 
its initial sound, then mouth, ear, net, eagle, sun sketched to our 
eye will furnish readily the sound Menes, that which we have 
been trying to bring definitively to the observer. The 
name of the city, Hara, is in the same manner made fully 
perceptible to our ear by pictures of a hand, an arm, a rosey 



Il6 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT, 

an archy making Hara ; and the word built can also be given 
to our ear by the same process^ a bow or beetle for B ; and 
so to the end, T being represented by a tigei' or tower. Such 
pictures or signs are called phonetic, from the Greek word 
Phone, a sound. 

Probably there begins now to dawn upon the reader's 
mind an idea of the meaning of the Egyptian hieroglyphics, 
which, with some exceptions, are not representations of 
ideas, as they are generally considered to be, but repre- 
sentatives of sounds; that is, are phonetic pictures, or an 
attempt at spelling by pictures. There are exceptions ; for 
some of them are not plionetic, but ideographic or symbolic; 
that is, the picture represents a full idea ; and some of them 
are what is called determinative, that is, limiting or determin- 
ing the application of the sound or thing represented ; and 
these exceptions, having no mark by which they can be 
known, cause the great difficulty in the way of reading the 
hieroglyphics of Egypt. If it were not for them, that is, 
if all were phonetic, — a spelling by pictures — the reading 
would be easy to any one who has once acquired a know- 
ledge of the ancient Egyptian language. This language 
may be learnt ; for that spoken now by the Copts of Egypt, 
the descendants of that ancient race, bears jiearly the same 
resemblance to that of their ancestors that the present Ital- 
ian does to the Latin, or the modern to the ancient Greek ; 
and, througli it, dictionaries and grammars of the ancient 
Egyptian language have been recently formed. The great 
Egyptologist, Bunsen, says : '' The conclusion therefore is 
that the dialect of the Christian Egyptians or Copts * is but 



* Lady Duff Gordon, in her sprightly letters from Egypt (1863-65), says, 
"The Copts are evidently the ancient Egyptians, — the slightly aquiline 
nose and long eye are the very same as those on the profiles on the tombs 
and temples, and also like the very earliest Byzantine pictures. Au reste, 
the face is handsome, but generally sallow and rather inclined to puffiness, 
and tht' fiLniri' wants tlu! Lnaci^ of the Arabs : nor Ikls any Copt the thorough- 



HOW ALPHABETS WERE ORIGINALLT MADE, 117 

a younger branch of the Egyptian language, the latest form 
of the popular dialect, although, from the age of the Ptole- 
mies downward, mixed with Greek words and forms. In its 
national elements it adheres even more closely to the old 
Egyptian than the modern Greek to the Hellenic.^^ 

In addition to the difficulty arising from the determina- 
tive and ideographic figures, the latter of which are very 
numerous, is one also from the large choice in the phonetic 
figures ; for, as we have seen above in our own language, ;S^ 
may be represented by sea^ ship, star, swallow, sack, sail, ser^ 
pentj sun, and a variety of other forms ; and we notice in 
the hieroglyphics, not only that this variety exists, but that 
the abundance of objects allowed them to employ adroit 
flattery or taste in the choice of figures. For instance, in 
writing Ptolemy, although many figures of objects would 
have supplied them with the sound L in that word, they 
chose the lion, Labo, for it 3 and in expressing the name of 
Noub, one of their gods, the sound B was afforded by their 
w^ord for a ram, one of the symbols of this deity, and this 
figure was taken in preference. 

We present now to the reader a sample of the Egyptian 
hieroglyphics in the word Ptolemy, with adjuncts, as taken 



from their monuments. It will be seen that they are en- 
closed in an oval (or cartouche), which signifies at once that 
it is a royal name ; their reading might be vertically, from 
top to bottom, or horizontally, from right to left, or the con- 
trary, there being no fixed rule, except that in horizontal 



bred distingue look of the meanest man or woman of good Arab blood. 
Their feet are the long-toed, flattish foot of the Egyptian statue, while the 
Arab foot is classically perfect, and you could put your hand under the 
instep." 



Il8 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

reading we must always read toward the head of the figures. 
In this case it is from left to right. We have 1st, a mat, 
pronounced in their language P or Pu ; 2d, a hemisphere, 
called T ; 3d, a cord, called U A; 4th, a lion, Laho ; 5th, a 
stand of a boat, called MA; 6th, two reeds, pronounced /; 
7th, the back of a chair, pronounced 8. The whole makes 
Ptulmis, the Coptic for " Ptolemy." 

Next comes a girdle buckle, pronounced Anch, signifying 
life or living ; and next, a hemisphere and a serpent, the 
former pronounced T, the latter called Tetbiy thus producing 
together, t t ; the whole making together Anchtay the Egyp- 
tian for ever-living^ eternal. 

Finally, in the cartouche, we have as in the beginning, a 
mat and hemisphere, P and T ; and then a twisted cord, 
H or Huy making P T H, or to Plitha, their god Vulcan ; 
then a plough or hoe, pronounced M R, to love ; and two 
reeds, pronounced I; the two together designating the past 
participle of the word M R, to love ; the whole signifying 
beloved of Plitlia. 

The oval line enclosing all is a cord called R N, and 
meaning ^^a name," and is of the kind used for enclosing 
royal names. 

The whole cartouche therefore reads, ^^Ptolemy, the ever- 
living y beloved, of Plitha ;" and the reader has in this, with 
the exception of the ideographs and determinatives, a full 
exhibition of the Egyptian hieroglyphics, which he is per- 
haps surprised to see is not a system of pictures addressed • 
directly to the mind, but of phonetics by pictures, that is, a 
mode of spelling by pictures, taking the initial sound of each 
picture presented. 

It must be obvious that this mode of expressing ideas, 
although answering for the labored cutting on walls and 
gateways and obelisks, would be unsuitable for any more 
rapid mode of making records ; and accordingly they soon 
resorted to a contraction of the figures, sometimes, indeed, 



x^OW ALPHABETS WERE ORIGINALLY MADE. 119 

retaining but little resemblance to the original forms. What 
was lost in the beauty and dignity in the sculpture was made 
up in the facility of expression ; but still, while a portion of 
the new characters were phonetic^ a very large number, as 
before, were ideographic or symbolic forms ; and, inasmuch 
as the meaning of these ideographic forms was known only 
to their learned men, who were always of the priestly order, 
and was kept exclusively among them, the new kind of 
writing is known as the sacred or hieratiG writing. 

The introduction of this latter, more rapid manner of 
presenting thoughts was made necessary by the use of 
papyrus, of which we have fragments variously estimated 
to belong to the 6th dynasty (B. C. 2100), and to the loth 
dynasty (B. C. 2000), the latter belonging to the time of the 
shepherd-kings. Papyrus (whence our word papei^) is a 
water plant, having ^triangular stalk without branches, about 
the size of a man's arm, and growing to the height of twelve 
or fifteen feet, where it is terminated by a beautiful, feathery 
tuft. It was, in those times, cultivated in the marshes 
toward the mouths of the Nile, and was a government mo- 
nopoly, which made it too expensive for use among any but 
the wealthy. It is not found at present anywhere in Egypt, 
but the writer of this work has seen abundance of it about 
the fountain of Arethusa, near Syracuse in Sicily. It is 
manufactured into writing material in that city, and sold 
to the curious. The outside rind of the plant is hard, like 
that of our Indian corn ; but within, is a fibrous pith, which 
is cut into thin slices ; and these, laid so as slightly to over- 
lap, and then with a cross-layer for strength, and glued, form 
a pretty good paper, on which we may easily write with a 
pen. The sculptures show it to have been in use in the time 
of Cheops, the builder of the first pyramid. 

In these steps of progress we come now to the most im- 
portant and useful of them all, that of the formation of 
a simple alphabet open to the use of every one, and without 



I20 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

the encumbrances of ideographs or determinatives. This 
we find first among the Phoenicians ; but the analogy be- 
tween it and what we have just been considering is so clear 
that we need have no hesitation in calling its origin Egypt- 
ian. We may believe that the Hyksos race, while in that 
country, adopted the phonetic system in the hieroglyphics, 
applying it to their own language ; and, scorning the efforts 
of the Egyptian priests to confine knowledge to their own 
class by entangling it among the ideographic and determina- 
tive forms to which they alone had the key, this more sim- 
ple and practical shepherd-race constructed an alphabet free 
from such encumbrances and open to the use of all. This 
alphabet, rejecting the employment of numerous figures (as, 
for instance, sea^ sword, star, &c., for the sound S), uses one 
figure for any one initial sound, and has all its letters phonetic, 
rejecting the use of ideographs and sy^nbolic forms. Thus 
every one could read, and knowledge became open to all. 
This race, as already noticed, had probably extended their 
settlements along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean 
previous to their final expulsion from Egypt; and from 
them grew up the great maritime cities of Sidon and Tyre, 
which afterward sent their colonies far to the west, even 
into Spain, and it is said as far as Britain. That their 
idea of representing sounds by figures, taking the initial 
sound in each figure, is copied from the Egyptian, will be 
evident from the following alphabet, gathered from Phoeni- 
cian inscriptions yet remaining. It will be seen that every 
letter is a picture, such as could be rapidly drawn, of an 
object or part of an object, the initial sound in whose name 
furnishes the power of that letter. We annex also the He- 
brew alphabet as deduced from Hebrew coins; and then we 
give the Greek (from which comes our own alphabet), and 
the reader will see that the letters which he is now looking 
at in this present book are through the Greek derived from 
the Plinonician; and doubtless through the Phoenician, liad 



HOW ALPHABETS WERE ORIGINALLY MADE. I2I 



Phoeni- 
cian.! 


Old Hebrew, from 
the coins. 


Names. 


Meanings of 
names. 


Sound 
of the 
letter. 


Gr'k 
letter 

A 


Names of 
Greek 
letters. 


Later 
He- 
brew. 


-X- 


;«rr>/ 


Aleph 


Ox 


a 


Alpha 


^ 


4 


^4^ 


Beth 


House 


bh 


B 


Beta 


1 





-\>/ 


Gimel 


Camel 


gli 


r 


Gamma 


Ji 


s 


<TTA 


Daleth 


Door 


dh 


A 


Delta 


T 


\ 


T-i 


He 




h 


E 


Epsilon 


n 


=) 


U^ 


Vau 


Nail, peg 


V 


Y 


Upsilon 


1 


i 


f^- 


Zayin 


Armor 


z 


Z 


Zeta 


T 




bQ 


Heth 


Hedge 


hh 


H 


Eta 


n 




Tet 


Serpent 


t 





Theta 


10 


A^ ^ 


Yodh 


Hand 


y 


I 


Iota 


■t 


y 


y 3 


Kaph 


r Hollow 
t hand 


kh 


K 


Kappa 


^1 


^ 


^A 


Lamedh 


Ox-goad 


1 


A 


Lambda 


"i 


V 


a/'f/ 


Mem 




m 


M 


Mu 


DO 


7 


y "i 


Nun 


Fish 


n 


N 


Nu 


Jt 


Y 




Samekh 


Triclinium 


s 


2 


Xi 





o 


•oo 


Yayin 


Eye 




O 


Omicron 


V 


T 




Pe 


Mouth 


ph 


n 


Pi 


DT 


If 


^•^^r 


Tsade 


Fish-hook 


ts 






^r 


0? 

A. 


T'TT 


Quoph 


Ear 


q 






p 


*» 


q H 


Eesh 


Head 


r 


p 


Kho 


1 


UJ 


WLU 


/Shin 
tSin 


Tooth. 


sh 

s 


2 


Sigma 




A 


X Y 


Tau 


r Cross- 
\mark 


th 


T 


Tau 


n 



11 



1 From the Sidon sarcophagus, about B. C. 599. 



122 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

their first start in the plionetic efforts of the Egyptians on 
their monuments. This is a long history, but such pro- 
gressive effort of the human mind is certainly a very inter- 
esting one. Our own A is here seen to be a picture of an 
ox's head, roughly sketched, but showing the horns, ears 
and nose, and has the power of the initial sound in the 
Phoenician or Hebrew word Aleph, ox. Our B is taken 
from the picture of a tent or house, in Hebrew, Beth, and so 
giving us the B sound. Our Q is not so close a copy but 
is evidently from the Greek /", and this from the Hebrew 
word Gimel, camel, the long neck and head of which can 
be traced in the Hebrew letter, and still better in the Phoeni- 
cian. Our D is a still nearer approach than the Greek A to 
the original Daleth, door ; and so through the remainder, 
where the reader can for himself trace the resemblance, and 
the origin of nearly all our alphabet. We have also the 
means of tracing the Samaritan alphabet to an ancient date; 
and the hostile jealousies between those people and the Jews 
from B. C. 721 to the present time are a warrant that the Sa- 
maritan is not simply a copy from the Hebrew, with which, 
however, it is almost indentical. Of Phoenician inscriptions 
there are several remaining, among them one hundred and 
twenty votive tablets ; but the best and longest is a recent 
discovery in the neighborhood of Sidon. A native, digging 
there for treasure in 1855, disinterred a sarcophagus of blue- 
black basalt, eight by four feet in size, on the surface of 
which is sculptured a human figure much resembling those 
on the Egyptian mummy cases. On this there is an inscrip- 
tion in twenty-two lines, the letters in perfect condition, and 
the resemblance between them and what we see on the He- 
brew coins so close, and the language also so similar to the 
Hebrew, that scholars conversant with the latter have little 
trouble in making a translation. It informs us that "King 
Esmunazar, king of the Sidonians,'' &c., had this tomb pre- 
pared for himself, "Carried away before my time," it says. 



HOW ALPHABETS WERE ORIGINALLY MADE, 1 23 

" in the flood of days — in dumbness ceases the son of gods. 
Dead do I lie in this tomb in the grave, in the place which 
I have built 'P and then it proceeds to warn all men not to 
" disturb him in the couch of his slumbers/^ with impreca- 
tions on any one who may molest his remains. The time 
of the sarcophagus is supposed to be about 599 B. C, but 
the completeness and finish of the character shows this to 
have been in use long before that time. 

For inscriptions distinctly Hebrew we have to resort to 
Jewish coins, the earliest of w^hich was that of Simon Mac- 
cabseus (B. C. 139). Such coinage was continued under the 
successive rulers till B. C. 40 ; the characters used are nearly 
or quite identical wdth those on the Phoenician monuments.^ 

We have given finally, in the above table, the square 
Hebrew alphabet in present use. It seems to have had its 
origin during ^^the captivity,^' when the Jews became famil- 
iar with the neat, arrow-headed character in use by the 
Euphrates. The change to this form commenced, it is sup- 
posed, in the time of Ezra, and advancing gradually, was 
not complete till the first century of our era. The letters 
in the square alphabet are evidently those referred to by our 
Saviour in his Sermon on the Mount, the word '' tittle/^ in 
the original xepaca, horn (Matt. v. 18), meaning the horn-like 
protuberance which the reader may see on several letters of 
this square form (for instance i<), while in this alphabet the yod 
^\joty^ is also strikingly smaller than any of the other letters. 

Inasmuch, then, as the language on the Phoenician monu- 
ments and in the Pentateuch may be considered as the same, 
and the written characters employed by both being also ap- 
parently identical, we are able, from such means, to place 
here before the reader what is probably a correct representa- 
tion of the first verse in Genesis and the first of the ten com- 
mandments as they were originally written. The reader 



1 See "History of Jewish Coinage," &c., by F. W. Madden, M.K.S.L. 



124 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

will observe that the reading is from right to left ; for that 
was the mode of writing then, as it is still in the Arabic : 

GENESIS I. 1. 
Original Hebrew. 

ITie same in the more modem square character. 

the God created beginning In 

Or^iinal. 

Mere modem. 
earth the and heavens 

EXODUS XX. 3. 

OrigiiniJ. 

More modem. 
gods thee to shall be Not 

Original. 

More modem. 

me before other 

The vast improvement by the Phoenicians in simplifying 
phonetics seems to have reacted upon the people from whom 
they drew their first idea of thus addressing tlie ear through 
the eye, and to liave produced among the Egyptians what 
we find as their most simple form of writing, namely, the 



HOW ALPHABETS WERE ORIGINALLT MADE, 125 

DemotiCy sometimes styled Encliorial? It Is a simple, plain 
alphabet, made for rapid writing, and it is difficult to trace 
any figures for its origin. Some have thought that it bears 
a resemblance to the Phoenician. It was used for the com- 
mon purposes of life, while the priests still adhered to the 
hieroglyphic or hieratic, concealing the mysteries of their 
doctrines in the ideographs. Plato, who travelled and 
studied in that country, says, "The priests teach their chil- 
dren two kinds of letters, those called sacred, and those 
which are more generally learned ;^^ also, "the people of 
Egypt generally, as distinguished from the priests, learn 
from their fathers or their kinsmen the training that belongs 
to each special mode of life, but letters only to a small ex- 
tent, and not all, but chiefly those who practice some of the 
arts.^^ We should indeed mistake, if we were to conclude, 
from the immensity of records on the monuments and papy- 
rus and the walls of their tombs, that learning was a general 
pursuit in that country ; for although these afford abundant 
exhibitions of the private life of those people, extending to 
the minutest incidents, no individual is ever represented 
reading, except in some official function ; and no female is 
ever seen reading or writing : all the men so employed have 
the air of professional scribes. 

In the long lapse of ages since the Egyptians ceased to be 
a nation, the keys to all its records — Hieroglyphic, Hieratic 
and Demotic — had been lost; and its numberless monuments 
and papyri and inscribed walls of tombs, spread thickly over 
with the means of speech, were yet speechless; dumb, though 
seemingly trying to find a voice. Learned men, century 
after century, wondered at the sight, and were perplexed. 
At length, in 1799, a French engineer connected with the 
first Napoleon^s expedition to that country, in constructing 
a bastion to a fort near the mouth of the Eosetta branch of 



^ Supposed to have been brought into use about the sixth century B. C. 
11* 



126 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

the Nile, disinterred a stele, or tablet, on which were inscrip- 
tions in three different characters : 1st, in Hieroglyphics ; 
2d, in an unknown character; and 3d, in Greek. The mid- 
dle one has since been ascertained to be Demotic. It was 
immediately surmised that the Greek was a translation of 
the other two; and so it has turned out to be. The French, 
on surrendering to the British arms, attempted to carry the 
tablet away with them, as not being a trophy of war ; but 
this was resisted, and it has been safely placed in the British 
Museum in London. This is the famous " Rosetta Stone,^^ 
and is in dimensions about three feet by two and a half, but 
broken at the corners, and with imperfect lines at the two 
ends. It immediately received great attention, and probably 
would have been deciphered in a short time if the firm be- 
lief that the hieroglyphic figures represented only ideas had 
not entirely excluded any suspicion of their being representa- 
tives of sounds. The younger Champollion, however, in 
1822, while attentively considering the cartouches of Ptole- 
my which are repeated on this stone, and which, from the 
Greek below, were known to be this name, and comparing 
them with one on an obelisk at Philse, where a Greek trans- 
lation below showed that the name was that of Cleopatra, 
observed that the figure of a lion, the fourth in the former, 
was the second in the latter; and he was aware that the lion 
was called laho in the ancient Egyptian language. He saw 
that laho might stand for the letter L in both inscriptions ; 
and the query darted into him with thrilling power, Is this 
figure Laho put there in order to give us, not the idea of 
lion but its initial sound, L? 

The discovery was made !* The hieroglyphics had at last 
found a voice ! and from every side they were speaking to 
him! 



^ An Enpjlish Rcholar, Dr. Young, was near making tliis discovery in 
1818, but after advancing some distance toward it, was misled by the belief 
in ideographs. 



HOW ALPHABETS V/ERE ORIGINALLY MADE. 1 27 

He persevered, and others have followed in his footsteps ; 
and although the efforts of the Egyptian priests in those 
ancient times to monopolize knowledge by keeping it so 
much in symbolic forms, still often baffles the determined 
men of our days, much has been gained ; for the books for 
such knowledge are to be found everywhere in Egypt, — 
columns, even sculptured figures of men and gods, magnifi- 
cent gateways, halls within and walls without, obelisks, 
tombs, — scarcely a surface anywhere, whether in palace, or 
temple, or the coffins and cerements of the dead, — all are 
inscribed ; great treasures of papyri are also still unrolled, 
or continually placed open to the eye. It is a world of 
knowledge that may well tempt men on and make them en- 
thusiasts ! 

The most elaborate works of recent date on this subject 
are those by the Chevalier Bunsen and by Lepsius, both 
of Berlin. The latter, with six or seven assistants, was sent 
by the Prussian government to Egypt, where he and his 
coadjutors spent about three years, during which time they 
examined sixty-seven pyramids (which, with few exceptions, 
were found to have been prepared for royal sepulchres) and 
one hundred and thirty tombs of private individuals, to 
which were added a vast number of other explorations. 
They made copies and sketches, so that they were able to 
return to Europe with eight hundred folio plates of draw- 
ings. These have been published by the same government 
in thirteen volumes of huge folio size, and in a style worthy 
of the royal patron. 

Subjoined is a copy, from Bunsen's work, of part of the 
sixth line on the ^^ Eosetta Stone,^^ in both the Hieroglyphic 
and Demotic characters. The central line is made up from 
other sources of Hieratic characters, to correspond to the 
other two. The reading, it will be perceived is from right 
to left. 



128 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT, 



fTffr p^as^ MV^r:^ 



rv 



Hieroglyphic inscription, from the Rosetta Stone. 




Hieratic writing, made to correspond to the above. 

l^ L ^/,^, i.ip W\(C v!^^'<^,2'iv^C^^ c/,fly cI^fA £:/>> I 

Corresponding portion of the Demotic inscription on the Rosetta Stone. 



CHAPTER XII. 
A WIFE FOR ISAAC. 



THERE was now in the tent of Abraham that wearing 
loneliness which comes when a beloved object is re- 
moved, and that object one about whom all the heart-strings 
had been entwined. We listen, as if every moment we are 
about to hear the well-remembered voice ; or are startled by 
the movement of a garment, and raise the eyes to look. 
There is a constant, lingering half-expectancy of the coming 
of the lost one ; but we wake to the dreary consciousness 
that there will be no coming, no voice, no well-remembered 
footstep ever again heard. Our thought, persistently on 
every occurrence, has for its first suggestion, ^^What pleasure 
this will give her," or, "About this I will consult her,'^ or, 
*^A double joy I will have in communicating this to her;'' 
and then we know once more that all such thought is vain. 
This is the world's darkest solitude. 

Sarah had been the only bond left between Abraham and 



4 



A WIFE FOR ISAAC. 1 29 

his father's house on the banks of the Euphrates. He felt 
now, more than ever, how utterly he was a stranger in the 
land of Canaan. 

News had recently been brought to him about his bro- 
ther's family at Haran, and he firmly resolved to seek there 
a wife for Isaac, who was now about forty years of age. 
He called his oldest and most trusted servant, and im- 
posed on him a solemn oath : ^^ Thou shalt not take a wife 
unto my son of the daughters of the Canaanites among 
whom I dwell ; but thou shalt go unto my country and to 
my kindred, and take a wife unto my son Isaac." He added 
that God would send his angel before the messenger. But 
never was Isaac himself to be restored to that land ; here in 
Canaan was his son to dwell ; God had firmly bound Abra- 
ham and his descendants to his present home. 

The servant, taking ten camels and numerous presents in 
addition to the purchase gifts, which, as we see also in the 
present habits of that country, were to be made for the in- 
tended wife, went on the long journey up toward Damascus, 
and across the northern edge of the great Arabian desert, 
and so to the fertile lands bordering on the northern por- 
tions of the great river of the East. Among the eight chil- 
dren of Nahor, Abraham's brother, was Bethuel, the owner 
of large flocks, but residing in a town or city, to the wells 
outside of which the women of the place were in the habit 
of resorting for water ; and to which the servant of Abra- 
ham now drew near. It was an anxious time for the man, 
for the happiness of the whole family in Canaan was de- 
pendent on his choice ; and how was he to choose among 
these family connexions, all strangers to him ? He remem- 
bered, however, his master's word that God would send his 
angel with him ; and he prayed now : " O Lord God of my 
master Abraham, I pray thee send me good speed this day, 
and show kindness unto my master Abraham. Behold, I 
stand here by the well of- water ; and the daughters of the 



130 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

men of the city come out to draw water ; and let it come to 
pass that the damsel to whom I shall say, Let down thy 
pitcher, I pray thee, that I may drink, and she shall say, 
Drink, and I will give thy camels drink also ; let the same 
be she that thou hast appointed for thy servant Isaac ; and 
thereby shall I know that thou hast showed kindness unto 
my master.'^ 

Before he had quite finished his prayer a young girl had 
approached the well and had descended and filled her pitcher. 
The servant's eyes lighted up with a double joy ; for not 
only was she there seemingly in immediate answer to his 
prayer, but she was also very beautiful, and with a counte- 
nance expressive of the gentleness and kindness of her heart. 
He doubtless felt that he could scarcely have chosen better 
if there had been the whole world to choose from. But 
still, was she the right person ? He did not know. 

He asked of her a drink, which she gave him ; and she 
then added, " I will draw water also for thy camels until 
they have done drinking.^^ The man had chosen his test 
skilfully ; for such an offer would not only indicate the 
right individual, but must also indicate on her part com- 
passion for the beasts and a true kindness of feeling even at 
the cost of some labor to herself; for the ten camels would 
require a large supply. The man, full of joy, inquired about 
her parentage ; and learning that she was Rebekah, daughter 
of Bethuel, his master's nephew, he ^' bowed down his head 
and worshipped the Lord." She was immediately presented 
with rich ornaments for her ears and arms. Having quickly 
returned home, she informed her brother Laban of what had 
occurred ; and the servant, his attendants and the camels 
were immediately taken to be sharers in the Oriental hos- 
pitality. Food was placed before him ; but, before partak- 
ing of it, he explained his errand, the circumstances of his 
arrival, his prayer by the well, and the practical answer to 
it by the unconscious girl herself. He added, "And now, 



A WIFE FOR ISAAC. 131 

if ye will deal kindly and truly with my master, tell me ; 
and if not, tell me ; that I may turn to the right hand or 
to the left/' The answer was in the true Eastern fashion ; 
not a full reference to the heart of the girl herself for a de- 
cision, but, " The thing proceedeth from the Lord : we can- 
not speak unto thee bad or good. Behold, Rebekah is before 
thee ; take her, and go, and let her be thy master's son's 
wife, as the Lord hath spoken/' 

Even Isaac himself, in all this commission by the servant, 
seems to have been a secondary personage ; certainly was 
not a principal actor in Canaan, any more than Eebekah 
was here at Haran. It was all according to Eastern usage, 
not only in those ancient but also in modern times. 

Further presents were made to Eebekah : gifts also, or 
rather what, according to the Eastern usages, may be called 
purchase-money, were received by Laban and Bethuel, the 
latter seemingly a brother named after their father Bethuel ; 
and without any delay — for the servant, knowing his mas- 
ter's anxiety, and how joyful this success would make him, 
was impatient to be gone — they started for Canaan, Rebekah 
being accompanied by her nurse and handmaids. 

Abraham appears to have been staying at this time at 
Beersheba, while Isaac was attending to a portion of their 
large possessions of herds and flocks by the wells of Lahai- 
roi, in the region immediately adjoining this on the south- 
east. But now he was on a visit to his father, probably in 
expectation of the arrival of the messenger sent to Haran. 
It was an anxious time among all. 

"And Isaac Avent out to meditate in the field at the even- 
tide ; and he lifted up his eyes, and saw, and behold the 
camels were coming. And Rebekah lifted up her eyes, and 
when she saw Isaac, she lighted off the camel. For she had 
said to the servant, What man is this that walketh in the 
field to meet us ; and the servant had said. It is my master ; 
therefore she took a veil and covered herself. And the ser- 



132 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

vant told Isaac all things that he had done. And Isaac 
brought her into his mother Sarah's tent, and took Rebekah, 
and she became his wife ; and he loved her ; and Isaac was 
comforted after his mother's death/' 



CHAPTER XIII. 
DEATH OF ABRAHAM. 



THERE is now, on the outskirts of Hebron at its north- 
ern side, a quadrangular enclosure, formed by a mas- 
sive wall two hundred feet by one hundred and fifty, and 
sixty feet in height. The large stones composing it are 
of the white limestone (Josephus calls it marble) of that 
country, and have on their fronts the raised panel or rebated 
style of ornament belonging to the Jewish and Phoenician 
architecture of the ancient times. We see the same style in 
what remains of the wall supporting the temple enclosure 
erected by Herod the Great at Mount Moriah, and also of 
the tower Hippicus built by that king, which now adjoins 
the Jaifa gate at Jerusalem. This wall at Hebron must 
certainly date back as far as the time of Herod, and may, 
not improbably, have been built by Solomon ; for Josephus 
speaks of the structure there as ancient in his time.^ The 
place has been so well guarded from remotest antiquity, and 
the traditions are so uniform and fixed respecting it, that 
there can be no doubt of its enclosing within its bounds the 
cave of Machpclah, Abraham's final resting-place. 

The aged patriarch died at Hebron, thirty-five years after 
the marriage of Isaac. Subsequently to this latter event, or, 
as some commentators believe, previous to it, another wife, 

1 De Bell., iv. 9. I 7. 



DEATH OF ABRAHAM. 



133 



/ 



Keturah by name, had been taken ; and by her he had six 
sons, whom he lived long enough to see grow up, and whom 
he sent to the regions south and east from Beersheba, so as 
to prevent any rivalship with Isaac after his own death. 

The following curtailed table of genealogies, and of the 
origin and relationship of nations will be useful now, and 
in the future progress of this work : 

From Sliem nine generations to 
Terah, 



Harau 



Abraham 
X 



Lot 



Milcah"! 
I 



Nahor 
I 



Moab 



Ben-ammi 



Bethuel 



Rebekali 
I 



I Sarah 



Isaac 
i 



Hagar 



Ishmae] 



Keturah ' 



Moabites Ammonites 



Esau 

I 
Edomites 



I 

Jacob 

I 
Israelites 



Medan 



Midian 



Ishmaelites Medanites Midianites 



The record of the death of the patriarch, as given in the 
Bible, is very simple : '^ Then Abraham gave up the ghost 
and died in a good old age [one hundred and seventy- 
five years], an old man and full of years; and was gathered 
to his people. And his sons, Isaac and Ishmael, buried him 
in the cave of Machpelah, in the field of Ephron, the son of 
Zohar the Hittite, which is before Mamre ; the field which 
Abraham purchased of the sons of Heth ; there was Abra- 
ham buried, and Sarah his wife/^ It appears thus that, at 
the last, Ishmael came back and helped to lay his father's 
body in its final resting-place. 

Thus terminated the life of one who, though a man of 
mixed character, yet stands before us, and has ever stood 
before the world, in vast proportions, looked to, studied, 
quoted and applauded. He is spoken of in the ?few Testa- 
ment as ^^ The friend of God.''^ Jehovah himself, speaking 



James ii. 23. 



12 



134 I^IFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

through Isaiah, calls him "Abraham, my friend ;'^^ Hebron 
now takes its name from such circumstance, and is called by 
its Mohammedan owners El-Khalil, " the friend." 

The friend ! That was all ; and yet what affection, what 
fulness of trust, w^hat nearness, what joy in intercourse, are 
comprised in the word ! There are no multiplied encomi- 
ums upon him in the Scriptures. His faults — even the 
meanness of his aberration from truth in Egypt and at Gerar 
— are not covered over, but are told with the same simplicity 
of record as are his acts of faith. We have seen him in these 
sketches, — where we have endeavored to view him as a man 
with human feelings and engaged in e very-day human life, — 
we have seen him as the simple nomadic chief, in person and 
manners and wants and public rule and domestic action, 
very similar to the nomadic chiefs of the present day. An 
Arab sheikh of our time gives us an exhibition of what 
Abraham was in outward bearing and appearance, probably 
in intelligence also, as well as in habits of life; for both in- 
dividuals, the ancient and modern, may be regarded as not 
largely gifted with what the world calls learning. 

But Abraham was the friend of God. The word is put 
before us prominently in the Scriptures, as if for our guid- 
ance ; and it is indeed a guide. No large endowments had 
he, mentally, or morally, or physically. His very courage 
had a flaw in it ; his mind had little treasure laid up ; the 
giants at Hebron probably scorned his strength ; he fell into 
weaknesses and sins; but yet he came out high above all, 
strong above all, wise al)ove all, — because he was "the 
Friend," the friend of God. It is something in which 
he can be imitated by all. 

The friend he was, on the plains at Ur, where, amid a na- 
tion of idolaters, he was true, and looked with clear eye up 
to Jehovah, and obeyed when called. The friend he was in 

» iBa. xli. 8. 



DEATH OF ABRAHAM. 13S 

Harau, when, amid its wide flowery plains and the attrac- 
tions of intercourse among relatives, he believed and obeyed, 
and left all, not knowing whither he was going, but only 
that God was leading him. The/r/e7ic? he was, following 
the call over those sandy intervening deserts to Damascus, 
and then away from its richness and beauty, and onward 
among the giants at Bashan, and so to live among the giants 
at Hebron, a stranger and helpless, except that he had God's 
protection, but not doubting that Protector. The friend he 
was, when God called him to sacrifice Isaac, and he w^ent 
and built the altar, and took the knife and raised it to strike! 

Always the friend ; trusting, true, faithful. And it was 
for this that God blessed him and honored him. Our friend- 
ship to God — what is it? Who can fathom the full depth 
of its distrusts, and w'eaknesses, and hesitancies, and of our 
idol-w^orship of the world and its belongings, and of our 
shame and backwardness in acknowledging God, and of our 
withholding when called to make sacrifices of sins or com- 
forts for him, and of our frequent practical disbelief? 

The world has changed greatly since Abraham's time. 
Centuries of experience have passed over men's heads ; his- 
tory has raised her voice for God ; intelligence has been 
sharpened and strengthened ; Jesus has come and given us 
his divine teachings, and his life and death ; we have all 
means of knowledge and all incentives to trust in God ; but 
among mortals Abraham yet stands alone in the fulness of 
his undoubting faith ; pre-eminent as The friend of God, 

We return to notice a few items respecting this burying- 
place at Machpelah, and its surrounding w^all. It lies on 
the southern side of a hill which, rising northwardly from 
Hebron, ascends to the table-land above. The spot is 
guarded with most careful jealousy by the Mohammedan 
owners of that country, w^hose fanaticism is peculiarly in- 
tense with regard to this, one of the most sacred places in 
their religion. There is a hole in the enclosing wall at its 



136 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT, 




The Ancient Wall enclosing the Cave of Machpelah ; also part of Hebron. 

fronn the South. 



Viewed 



foundations near its northwestern corner, and the Jews are 
allowed there to reach through and touch the native rock, 
which they can do by lying flat on the ground. This is 
the only privilege allowed them with regard to this spot. 
Christians were equally debarred from entering the walls 
until the visit of the Prince of Wales to Palestine in 1862, 
when, after negotiations with the Turkish Government and 
great difficulties thrown in the way, he was allowed, as a 
token of great favor to the British government, to enter with 
a suite of seven persons, among them Dean Stanley, who 
has given an account of the visit. The southern end of the 
enclosed space is occupied by a Turkish mosque facing to- 
ward the north, where is a court or open square, and beyond 
this, quite at the northern end, is a smaller mosque. In the 
larger mosque just on the riglit, as it is entered from the 
court, is a recess faced with marble and separated from tlie 
spectator by a railing of silver; within this is a cenotaph or 



DEATH OF ABRAHAM. I37 

raised platform six feet high, and covered with green cloths 
embroidered in gold. The Turks call it Abraham's tomb ; 
but it is undoubtedly only a monumental representative of 
what is below. On the opposite side of the mosque is a 
similar cenotaph for Sarah^ similarly guarded and enriched ; 
and further in are cenotaphs of like form for Isaac on the 
right, and Rebekah on the left ; the grating here is not of 
silver but iron. Beyond the court in the smaller northern 
building are similar monuments for Jacob and Leah. Near 
Abraham's cenotaph, outside the railing, in the pavement is 
a circular hole about eight inches across, at the lower part of 
which, as far as the visitors could see and feel, was the living 
rock. '' This cavity,'' says Stanley, " appears to open into a 
dark space beneath, and that space (which the guardians of 
the mosque believed to extend under the whole platform) can 
hardly be anything else than the ancient cave of Machpelah. 
This was the only aperture which the guardians recognized. 
A lamp is let down at night and burnt in the place beneath." 
Since that visit further explanations have been made by 
Mons. Pioretti, formerly engineer in the Sardinian army, 
but at the time of this visit, acting as engineer and archi- 
tect for Suray Pasha at Jerusalem ; and in consequence of his 
official position having unusual privileges. He says, ^^ The 
true entrance to the patriarch's tomb is to be seen close to 
the western wall of the enclosure and near the northwest 
corner. I observed the Musselmans themselves did not go 
near it. In the court opposite the entrance of the mosque 
there is an opening through which I was allowed to go down 
for three steps, and I was able to ascertain by sight and 
touch that the rock exists there, and to conclude it to be 
about five feet thick. From the short observations I could 
make during my brief descent, as also from consideration of 
the eastern wall of the mosque and the little information I 
extracted from the chief Santon who jealously guards the 
sanctuary, I consider that a part of the grotto exists under 
12* 



138 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

the mosque and that the other part is under the court, but 
at a lower level than that lying under the mosque. This 
latter must be separated from the former by a vertical stratum 
of rock which contains an openings as I conclude for two 
reasons ; first, because the east wall being entirely solid and 
massive, it requires a good foundation ; second, because the 
petitions which the Musselmans present to the Santon to be 
transmitted to the Patriarchs are thrown, some through one 
opening, some through the other, according to the Patriarch 
to whom they are directed ; and the Santon goes down by 
the way I went, whence I suppose that on that side there is 
the vestibule, and that the tombs may be found below it. 

" I explained my conjecture to the Santon himself, after 
leaving the mosque, and he showed himself very much sur- 
prised at the time, and told the pacha afterward that I knew 
more about it than the Turks themselves. The fact is that 
even the Pacha, who governs the province, has no right to 
penetrate into the enclosure, where (according to Musselman 
legend), the patriarchs are living, and only condescend to 
receive the petitions addressed to them by mortals.^^ 



XIV. 

ISAACS FAMILY. 



ISAAC was seventy-five years old when Abraham died. 
He and Ishmael, after performing the last solemn duty 
to their father's remains, had turned again toward their 
homes ; Isaac to the well Lahai-roi, about forty miles S. E. 
from Hebron, and the older brother to his tribe and his fam- 
ily in Arabia. In the Hebrew tribe the aged patriarch was 
greatly missed ; fi)r not only had lie been a j^erson who at- 
lached himself to all around him, l)ut the belief in the con- 



ISAAC'S FAMILY, * 139 

stant communion between God and him had given him a 
deep sacredness in the regards of all. 

The tent of Isaac would now present to the eyes of ob- 
servers a man amiable and beloved, but lacking the com- 
manding force of his father ; a woman, his wife, very beau- 
tiful, keenly observant, and quick in resource; and, in 
addition, two sons, twins, and at Abraham^s death fifteen 
years of age. The mother's regards were always attentively 
fixed upon them both. 

They were almost the opposites of each other in appearance 
and disposition. One was fond of home and of his mother, 
and was of course her favorite. The other was a hardy; 
restless youth, who, disdaining the monotony of the pastoral 
life and of the tent, took his bow and arrows and roamed 
over the country, and brought back game to his father with 
stirring accounts of his adventures and successes in the chase. 
The latter, who had been the first to make his appearance 
in the world, was at his birth, covered with hair, and was 
named from this circumstance JEsau^ ^' hairy.'' The other on 
the same occasion, had his hand on his brother's heel, and 
was called from this Jacob, " holding the heel," a name of 
unpleasant significance ; for the verb whence it is derived 
means also to act deceitfully,^ to supplant. It had previously 
been declared of them by divine communication to Isaac, that 
" two manner of people should come from them," and " the 
elder should serve the younger." 

The mother soon became partial. We can scarcely wonder 
at it, as we see the one child almost deformed by his hairy 
covering, and the other fair to look upon; the one soon man- 
ifesting the rough, bold characteristics so marked in after 
life, and the other pliant and gentle; the one soon sheltering 
himself in his rude manners under the father's authority, 
and the other asking in earnest tones for the mother's help. 



^ See Gen. xxvii. 36 ; Jer. ix. 4. 



140 liPe-scenes from the old testament. 

So the children, and afterward the lads, grew up, becoming 
every day more diverse in character, and, what was most 
unwise on the part of their superiors, more distinguished in 
the parental regards. 

We can already see trouble darkening in that tent^ Esau 
had the rights of primogeniture ; and although these may 
not have been fully defined at that time, the sentiment 
which afterward made them fully marked was undoubtedly 
prevalent at an early date. As we see these rights afterward 
in Jewish history, they were, 1, honor and authority next 
to that belonging to parents (Gen. xlix. 3) ; 2, peculiar con- 
secration to God (Ex. xxii. 29) ; 3, priority in priestly 
office (Levit. viii. 2 : Num. viii. 17) ; and 4, a double por- 
tion of the father^s goods (Deut. xxi. 17). 

The sons had advanced beyond boyhood and were begin- 
ning to be mature in character, when one day, the older 
brother coming home from the chase faint and hungry, found 
the other engaged in the less manly occupation of cooking 
a mess of lentiles or beans,^ the odor of which was most 
tempting to the keen appetite of the huntsman. He asked 
immediately for some of the food, and the astuteness of 
Jacob was awakened. The latter said, 

" Sell me this day thy birthright.^^ 

" Behold, I am at the point to die, and what profit shall 
this birthright be to me,^' was the characteristic, careless 
reply of Esau. 

" Swear to me this day," said Jacob ; and Esau swore ; 
and he sat down and ate and drank, and then rose up and 
went his way. 



1 Robinson says, in his visit to Akabah, not very far from this, " We 
bought little except a supply of lentiles or small beans, which are common 
in Egypt and Syria under the name of yl(/(^w ; the same from which the 
pottage was made for which Esau sold his birthright. We found them very 
palatable, and could well conceive that to a weary hunter faint with hun- 
ger they must be quite a dainty." 



ISAAC'S FAMILY. 141 

He had sold that on which he placed little value ; for 
even the right of chief inheritance was of slight moment to 
one who could range freely over the world, and find subsist- 
ence everywhere, and to whom the care of flocks and herds 
would only be an encumbrance ; but to the young man at 
home, calculating in his disposition, already shrewd, and 
always jealous of his brother^s priority, it was a great tri- 
umph ; one which was doubtless shared also by the watchful 
mother. The triumph was the greater in Jacob's estimation 
because Esau had obtained those birthrights by only a few 
minutes' precedence in life ; and the younger knew that he 
could turn to good account what his brother esteemed so 
lightly. Jacob had often fretted over the difference between 
him and his brother in this matter of priority ; and from 
his mind's dwelling so much on the subject, the rights of 
primogeniture had taken, in his view, even greater import- 
ance than they deserved. He thought now with great joy, 
that they were all his own ! 

A drought and famine in this higher region at Lahai-roi, 
which was particularly subject to the influence of heat, now 
drove Isaac and his family into the lower country belonging 
to the Philistines, bordering on the Mediterranean. The 
divine communication had directed him not to go to Egypt, 
but to stop in this place ; he went to Gerar, where Abime- 
lech — probably not the king in Abraham's time — was then 
the ruler. Here again, with regard to his wife, was prac- 
tised the same base deception that we have seen in his 
father's case with respect to Sarah ; and he called Eebekah 
his sister, " Because she was fair to look upon,"^ and he 



^ Miss Martineau, speaking of the Jews whom she saw at Hebron, says, 
" Here and at Jerusalem, and elsewhere, we saw many Jews with fair com- 
plexions, blue eyes and light hair. Such eyes I never saw as both the 
blue and the brown ; soft, noble eyes such as bring tears into one's own, one 
knows not why. The form of the face was unusually fine, and the com- 
plexion clear brown or fair ; the hair beautiful." 



142 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

feared that her beauty might bring him into danger, if the 
true facts were known. A timely discovery by the king, 
however, saved both from the effects of this base lying ; and 
Abimelech, with upbraidings which ought to have been 
keenly felt by them, gave them the royal protection, with 
threats of severest punishment to any of his subjects who 
might do them harm. A feeling of awe connected with this 
Hebrew race seems to have impressed itself on all their 
neighbors; just as now, all over the world, there is a senti- 
ment akin to this, however in other respects we may regard 
this people ; — a feeling tinged with awe, an unacknowledged 
and perhaps resisted feeling of respect as for a mysterious 
power connected with them. They are a living, strange 
enigma in our midst. That same feeling appears to have 
seized upon their neighbors then, — upon the nobles at Mamre 
and upon the king of the Philistines. The Hebrews were 
shrunk from, yet tolerated and treated with tenderness; 
were respected but not loved ; they seem to have given no 
love to others. Doubtless the often-expected assurances from 
God that he would give to their posterity all this land, were 
known with more or less distinctness among their neighbors, 
for such things could scarcely be kept secret. The assur- 
ances had just been repeated to Isaac himself, with the mys- 
terious declaration, "And in thy seed shall all the nations 
of the earth be blessed." These things known to their 
neighbors, a jealousy, a suspicion, a strange fear, and yet 
with them, a disposition to honor and treat with tender- 
ness, but not with love, a people so honored of heaven and 
so linked in with promises of future power and glory, 
must have prevailed among the surrounding nations or 
tribes. 

Isaac remained in the country of the Philistines, and 
" waxed great, and went forward and grew until he became 
very great ; for he had possessions of flocks and herds and 
great store of servants, and the Philistines envied him." 



ISAAC'S FAMILY, 143 

The king there finally said^ ^^Go from us; for thou art much 
mightier than we/^ 

He went leisurely along eastwardly, digging successive 
wells for his flocks ; but the people of the country had be- 
come sensitive in their jealousy of his increasing greatness, 
and contested the wells with his herdsmen, falsely claiming 
them as their own on account of previous occupancy. He 
yielded peaceably, retiring until at last (the drought in this 
long interval having ceased) he reached the well-remem- 
bered spot of his father's residence at Beersheba. He knew 
it well indeed ; for from this place he had been conducted 
by his father to Moriah for the intended sacrifice, where he 
was to be the victim ; and here his mother had hung around 
his neck with tears of joy and gratitude when he was restored 
to her and she heard of the fearful command to slay him 
on the altar, and how nearly it had been fulfilled. Isaac 
himself now erected an altar at Beersheba, and called upon 
the name of the Lord and pitched his tent at that place. 

He had a visit here from the Philistine king, Abimelech, 
accompanied by a friend and by Phicol, the chief captain 
of his army; and the interview was strikingly characteris- 
tic of the feelings on both sides. 

" Wherefore come ye to me,'' he said, " seeing ye hate me, 
and have sent me away from you?" They replied, 

^^We saw certainly that the Lord was with thee; and we 
said. Let there be now an oath betwixt us, even betwixt us 
and thee, and let us make a covenant with thee ; that thou 
wilt do us no hurt, as we have not touched thee, and as we 
have done unto thee nothing but good, and have sent thee 
I away in peace; thou art now the blessed of the Lord." 

" And he made them a feast, and they did eat and drink." 

He might well feel himself blessed of the Lord ; for as 

he stood by his tent, his eyes could range over flocks and 

herds far and wide, and over a tribe of retainei's so numer- 

I ous as to give him importance whether as friend or adver- 



144 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

sary. He knew also that this sentiment of awe and respect 
and fear as for one strangely favored from on high had taken 
possession of his neighbors, though mingled with jealousy. 
Their jealousy was a compliment. Their dislike, grounded 
as it was on apprehension, he might also feel to be compli- 
mentary to his power as the sheikh of a powerful tribe. 

But a domestic trouble here broke in upon his compla- 
cency and enjoyment. Esau, reckless of the wishes of both 
father and mother, had taken two wives from the adjoining 
Hittite tribes, idolaters who would lead off this ever-way- 
ward man from the worship of the true God. He was still 
the favorite son of the father; for his bold, frank manner, 
his daring in the chase, his manliness and even his restive- 
ness under restraint making the father's stronger power 
necessary as a curb, had endeared him to Isaac, who marked 
the contrast to all this in Jacob's timidity and astuteness, 
and his gentleness, and partiality for his mother. Esau and 
Jacob were forty years old and Isaac was an hundred, when 
this connexion by marriage with the Canaanites took place. 
The wives were brought to the father's tent and became 
part of the household, creating still greater discomfort in 
the family than had existed before. The oldest son, how- 
ever, was ill adapted by previous habits to settle down into 
the ways of quiet pastoral life, and his precarious means of 
living by hunting made it necessary to domesticate his 
family where there were surer means of subsisting. Rebekah 
fretted under the intrusion. 



THE STOLEN BLESSING, 14S 



CHAPTER XV. 
THE STOLEN BLESSING, 

YEARS passed on ; — thirty-seven years after this mar- 
riage of Esau, his own unsettled habits still unchanged, 
and his Hittite wives still causing, as may well be im- 
agined, great discomfort to his mother. Jacob had now 
reached his seventy-seventh year,^ and had not yet taken a 
wife. His mother^s love had so far been sufficient for him; 
his quiet home-feelings found sufficient enjoyment in her 
society ; probably the conduct of the Hittite wives of his 
brother made him feel that he was the more necessary to 
her, and made him averse to looking for a nearer com- 
panion for himself. Suddenly there was a great disruption 
in the domestic circle, and the quiet, domestic man was 
compelled to flee from home. The cause was one which 
brings the full character of this family to our view. 

The father was now one hundred and thirty-seven years 
old, and the infirmities of age w^ere taking strong hold on 
him ; as an especial an^ grievous affliction, his eyesight had 
almost entirely failed. Unable to distinguish objects, con- 
fined to his couch, and feeling that even the shreds of life 
were scarcely left to him, he determined, while his faculties 
would permit it, to place his first-born in safe possession of 
the position belonging to him in the family and tribe. Con- 

^ These numbers, and others connected with them, differ from those 
given by some commentators, but they seem to be unavoidable, and are 
deduced thus: Joseph was promoted in Egypt (eI, 30 (Gen. xli. 46). Nine 
years afterward his father came to Egypt (Gen. xlv. 6), Joseph (zt. 39 ; 
Jacob was then 130 years old (xlvii. 9) ; consequently Jacob was 91 years 
old at Joseph's birth ; he had then been 14 years in Padan Aram (compare 
Gen. XXX. 24 with xxxi. 38) ; and was therefore 77 at the time of the 
above occurrences. 
13 



146 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

sequently he summoned him one day, as he supposed, in 
private. 

" My son/^ he said, and paused so as to discriminate by 
the voice ; for his eyes had failed so much that he could no 
longer judge by sight. 

" Behold, here I am," said Esau, and the tones of voice 
were satisfactory. 

" Behold, now I am old, I know not the day of my death; 
now, therefore, take, I pray thee, thy weapons, thy quiver 
and thy bow, and go out to the field and take me some 
venison ; and make me savory meat, such as I love, and 
bring it to me, that I may eat ; that my soul may bless thee 
before I die." 

Esau took his instruments for hunting and went out. 
The interview, however, was not secret, for Rebekah had 
overheard every word. 

Well, indeed, might she be alarmed ! She knew from the 
old man's favoritism, and from the son's claims of birthright, 
what the blessing would be. It would be the placing of 
the bold, and to her often rebellious, Esau over the house- 
hold, and would be giving additional haughtiness and power 
to his heathen wives in the tent, and moreover, would be 
the humiliation of Jacob before all the tribe. She hurried 
secretly to the latter, told him all that had occurred, and 
gave him instructions what to do. He was to go to the 
flock and bring home two good kids, with which she was to 
make savory meat for the old man, which he was to pre- 
sent as the desired venison. "But, behold, Esau my 
brother," he objected, " is a hairy man, and I am a smooth 
man ; ray father, peradventure, will feel me, and I shall 
seem to him as a deceiver ; and I shall bring a curse upon 
me and not a blessing." She replied, 

" Upon me be thy curse, my son ; only obey my voice 
and go and fetch them." 

There was need for expedition ; for at any moment the 



THE STOLEN BLESSING, 147 

older brother might return. The kids were brought and 
the savory mess prepared. She took some of Esau^s best 
garments and put them on Jacob, and with the skins of the 
kids covered his hands and the exposed parts of his neck, so 
as to represent, as far as possible, the hairiness of the older 
son. And so the mess was taken in to the old man, while 
his wife, all nervous, and anxious and trembling with fear, - 
tried both to watch the proceedings within the tent and to 
guard against any intrusions from without. Jacob ap- 
proached his father with no less fear ; for it was a perilous 
experiment that he was making. His heart quaked under 
the consciousness of the lying and deception. If he should 
be discovered, a curse would ensue such as his mother, 
though offering to bear it could yet never cancel. We 
can imagine the scene ; — the keenly watchful mother quiver- 
ing with nervous apprehension at every motion ; the son 
self-condemned and frightened at the terrible position he 
was in ; feigning composure, while he knew that he was shak- 
ing with dread ; contending for a mastery over himself and his 
voice, and while fiercely struggling, yet under the necessity 
of appearing natural and easy ; appalled by the very quiet and 
silence and dimness in the room, yet knowing that an inter- 
ruption would bring to him a fearful curse instead of a bless- 
ing. The old man^s helplessness and blindness were pathetic 
appeals to any heart. Jacob had to steel himself against 
all such affection. — There was need of haste. He broke 
the silence : 

" My father V 

" Here am I ; who art thou, my son ?'^ 

" I am Esau, thy first-born. I have done according as 
thou badest me. Arise, I pray thee, sit and eat of my ven- 
ison, that thy soul may bless me.^^ 

"How is it that thou hast found it so quickly, my 
sonr 

" Because the Lord thy God brought it to me.'^ 



148 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

" Come near, I pray thee, that I may feel thee, my son, 
whether thou be my very son Esau, or not/^ 

The words, and especially the allusion to God as helper, 
had burnt the lips of the son as he spake them, but his 
astuteness bore him through. He approached, deeply agi- 
tated ; but the old man^s touch was itself a trembling and 
feeble one from his debility. He felt him, and said, 

" The voice is Jacob's voice, but the hands are the hands 
of Esau ; art thou my very son Esau ?'^ 

"I am.^^ 

" Bring it near to me, and I will eat of my son^s venison, 
that my soul may bless thee.^^ 

It was brought, with wine also, and he ate and drank. 
Then the old man said, 

" Come near, now, and kiss me, my son.^^ 

He did so; and there seems to have been a peculiar 
odor from Esau's raiment, which was perceived by the 
father. 

Then came the blessing : 

" See, the smell of my son is as the smell of a field which 
the Lord hath blessed ; therefore God give thee of the dew 
of heaven, and the fatness of the earth, and plenty of corn 
and wine ; let people serve thee, and nations bow down to 
thee ; be lord over thy brethren and let thy mother's sons 
bow down to thee ; cursed be every one that curseth thee, 
and blessed be he that blesseth thee." 

Jacob went out rich in his father's words, but poor in his 
own heart, for he had stripped it of nobleness and truth, 
and of that consciousness which is man's best support. He 
joined his mother, and as their eyes met, amid the triumph 
which brightened them, there was the deep self-condemna- 
tion springing from joint participation in an unmitigated 
wickedness. They had lied to and grossly deceived the in- 
firm, blind, good old man, the husband and father. How 
often, afterward, must Jacob have thought of this scene 



THE STOLEN BLESSING. 149 

when his own sons were stinging his heaft, and whitening 
his hairs by their wicked acts ! 

During these proceedings in the tent, Esau had been 
ranging over the hills for game, and had been successful. 
He hoped now to be repaid for the loss of his birthright 
which he had formerly so weakly and impulsively sold. 
He had thought often, since, of that act, which had taken 
in his eyes a more serious character as years had passed on 
and he had wives and children, for whose sake he could now 
see the value of the chief inheritance ; his own habits being 
so adverse to finding means for their support. His wives, 
who had made themselves hateful to his mother, might in- 
deed have no certain home after his father^s death, unless it 
might now be secured. But now his father, he hoped, would 
fully cancel the sale of that birthright. He had asked for 
the venison, ^^ that my soul may bless thee before I die.^^ 
Assuredly it would be a great blessing, this, the final one; 
it would doubtless place him at the head of the family and 
of the tribe. He would yet triiimph over his cunning 
brother ! 

Such thoughts spurred on the huntsman over hill and 
across valley, until the venison was secured. He returned 
then, quickly, and made with it the savory mess such as he 
had often before prepared. It was well for Jacob and his 
mother that they had used expedition ; for the former was 
scarcely out of the old man^s presence, when the other son 
came before him in the tent. Isaac was resting after the 
recent unwonted effort; the divine afflatus which he had 
felt within him was passed ; he felt happy in the conscious- 
ness of what had just transpired ; this son was his favorite; 
the eldest born, he believed, was now safe in the rich bless- 
ing which God had, through him, bestowed. He heard sud- 
denly a movement in the tent, as of one approaching, and 
then the words, 

13 * 



150 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

" Let my father arise, and eat of his son's venison, that 
thy soul may bless me/' 

"Who art thou f' 

"I am thy son, thy first-born, Esau/' The old man 
trembled with exceeding agitation : he recognized the voice. 

" Who ? where is he that hath taken venison, brought it 
me, and I have eaten of all before thou camest, and have 
blessed him ? yea, and he shall be blessed." 

The oldest born raised "a great and exceeding bitter cry." 
When he could find words, they were in deepest anguish, — 

" Bless me, even me also, O my father !" 

The old man's anguish was not less keen : 

" Thy brother came with subtilty, and hath taken away 
thy blessing." 

" Is he not rightly named Jacob" [the Supplanter] ? said 
Esau ; " for he hath supplanted me these two times ; he took 
away my birthright ; and behold now he hath taken away 
my blessing." He cried then in that bitterness of despair 
which only such a hearfcan know — 

" Hast thou not reserved a blessing for me ?" The an- 
swer came — 

" Behold, I have made him thy lord, and all his brethren 
have I given him for servants ; with corn and wine have I 
sustained him ; and what shall I do now unto thee, my 
son?" 

" Hast thou but one blessing, my father ? bless me, even 
me also, O my father !" " And Esau lifted up his voice 
and wept." 

The father's tears must have been as bitter ; for not only 
had he failed in rightly bestowing the blcvssing, but he felt 
also tlie heinousnessof the deception practised upon him by 
the twin-born. He answered — 

"Behold, thy dwelling shall be the fiitness of the earth, 
and of i\\ii dew of heaven from above. And by tliy sword 
shalt thou live and shalt serve thy brother; and it shall 



THE STOLEN BLESSING. 151 

come to pass when thou shalt have the dominion, that thou 
shalt break his yoke from off thy neck/^ 

Both father and son felt that the blessing so strangely 
misdirected must have its way, and could not be recalled. 

What is lost is apt to take additional value in our eyes 
because it is lost. So Esau's mind brooded over these late 
scenes until, in addition to hatred toward his brother, an 
intense desire for revenge grew up in his heart. He was 
not naturally revengeful, but frank and manly; but this 
very frankness and manliness helped now to fill the measure 
of his disgust and abhorrence toward one who had sup- 
planted him by trick and treachery. In his rage he uttered 
dark threats against the life of Jacob. Any check imposed 
on him by his father's presence he believed would soon 
be removed by the death of the latter. " Then,'' in his 
usual frankness and his intense hatred, he said, '' I will slay 
my brother Jacob." 

But the mother's love for her favorite made her keenly 
watchful of all Esau's proceedings and his words. The 
tent was indeed in a turmoil of feeling ; all peace had de- 
parted from it. The old man, feeble and blind and now 
distrustful of all, was overwhelmed by sadness ; he could 
only listen and grieve. All else was reciprocal wrath ; he 
lay fearful and trembling for the possible result. Esau 
could not be a counsellor to him ; Rebekah had helped to 
betray him ; Jacob was too artful and selfish to be trusted ; 
whom could he trust ? 

His wife roused him from this stupor of body and mind 
and heart. She stood by his side and the tones of her voice 
indicated fretful ness and anger ; both feelings were partly 
real, partly assumed. " I am weary of my life," she said, 
" because of the daughters of Heth [the two Hittites] ; if 
Jacob take a wife of the daughters of Heth, such as these 
which are of the daughters of the land, what good shall my 
life do me ?" Doubtless they had, with sharp tongues, been 



152 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

venting upon her some of their husband's and their own 
spleen ; but her words came more from a fear for Jacob than 
from her own personal discomfort. Her watchful attention 
had brought to her a knowledge of Esau's threats ; she had 
sent for her favorite and had advised him to flee to her 
brother Laban in Haran, with the counsel, " Tarry with him 
a few days until thy brother's fury turn away ; . . . . then 
will I send and fetch thee from thence. Why should I be 
deprived also of you both in one day ?" Esau, indeed, was 
not apt to harbor revengeful feelings for a long while, but 
they were the more violent when they did rule him ; his 
mode of life made him open and forgiving, but his indig- 
nation and hatred while they lasted were the more deadly. 

The father sent for Jacob, and directed him to go to 
Padan-Aram (Haran), and take as a wife there one of the 
daughters of Laban, brother of his mother: ^^And God 
Almighty bless thee, and make thee fruitful, and multiply 
thee, that thou mayest be a multitude of people ; and give 
thee the blessing of Abraham, to thee and to thy seed with 
thee, that thou mayest inherit the land wherein thou art a 
stranger, which God gave unto Abraham." 

So the son went forward on his long journey in sadness and 
loneliness, and yet with a feeling of relief. This was not a 
pleasant home to him any more. Even in his mother's pre- 
sence there was a feeling of self-condemnation, which he knew 
she also must have in her own heart ; and there was the mu- 
tual distrust even of each other, such as people always have 
when they have been accomplices in premeditated iniquitous 
acts. 

Esau, seeing how distasteful to the father his marriage 
with the llittite women had been, went now to Arabia and 
procured there as wife a daughter of his half-uncle Ishmael; 
but after a while he took his wives, and doubtless also a share 
of the flocks and removed to a mountainous country about 
forty-five miles east from Beersheba; and settling there, soon 



JACOB IN EXILE, 153 

became the head of a tribe. It was called after him, 
Edom (Gen. xxv. 30 ; xxxvi. 1); and was a fertile region, 
intersected by deep, wooded valleys, with which his hunting 
expeditions must have made him familiar. The fact of his 
going there for a permanent home was itself a sinful slight- 
ing of the promises of God to Abraham and Isaac with re- 
gard to Canaan as an inheritance for their descendants. 
Indeed, the tribe eventually became idolaters. 

Ishmael was now prospering in Arabia. He became 
there the father of twelve sons, each of whom was made a 
prince of a district or tribe. 



CHAPTER XVI. 
JACOB IN EXILE. 



JACOB'S heart felt relieved of a weight when he had left 
that tent behind him, although he was not sure that 
Esau, skilled in the chase and in the use of weapons, might 
not pursue him or be lying in wait amid uninhabited spots, 
where murder could be so easily concealed. But he passed 
on, mile after mile, without interruption ; and at last the 
long distance intervening gave him more assurance of safety; 
and he slackened his pace, and had time to think. 

Thinking is not often pleasant after a wicked act ; for 
even success and triumph are then dashed with bitterness. 
He tried to justify himself for that deed by his father's bed- 
side ; and arguments came, as they always will come in any 
unrighteous cause, when they are called for. His very 
name, he saw, had always been suggestive to him of mip- 
planting^ — the meaning that Esau himself had given to it 
in his indignation, and which must often have been sport- 
ively or angrily given to it by others. Such a character- 



154 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT 

istic, therefore, seemed to be impressed upon him by his name 
itself, and that name derived from a significant circumstance 
at birth. 

He argued also, as he went along, how utterly unfit Esau 
was for such a last, formal blessing. The manner in which 
that brother had bartered away his birthright showed how 
little value he would place on any blessing; and indeed, it 
seemed as if no blessing could avail, unless it would also 
change the character and life of the reckless man. Then 
also, it was only a few minutes' precedence in birth that gave 
him any claim ; and that claim, through indifference to it by 
its owner, seemed to have been altogether forfeited in favor 
of the twin-brother, who prized the father's blessing above 
all other things in life. 

So Jacob could argue, as he travelled on in that journey, 
left now to shape his future away from the influences of home, 
which indeed seem never to have been of the best kind, 
whether we consider the mother's injudicious partiality to- 
ward himself, the father's leaning toward the reckless 
brother, or that brother's selfish disregard of the comfort of 
others. Jacob's home education had not been a good one. 

A thought will probably here occur to the reader's mind, 
and assume the shape of the query, '^ Why were such men 
chosen to be the demonstration for God before the world ?'' 

The best answer perhaps is, that He took those who were 
willing. Abraham was willing, and although a man full 
of weaknesses, was, even with them, still the friend of God. 
Isaac was willing, though also a man of weakness. And so 
was Jacob. None of them were perfect ; all of them weak, 
yet willing. So Jacob was taken now, and God's blessing 
came upon him. 

We are to judge those men, also, not by the improved 
knowledge in our time, when we have libraries of books in 
which God in history through near six thousand years can 
be read, and when we have also the greatest of all teachings 



JACOB IN EXILE. ' 155 

through Christ, God himself manifest in examples and les- 
sons of instruction Avorthy of the Divinity ; but we must 
look back and see those men with no advantages of books, 
and without teachings except what they received in the in- 
frequent, direct communications from heaven. These com- 
munications scarcely glanced at doctrines or at information, 
but were more in the manner of calls to action and of pro- 
mises adapted to encourage and sustain these exceptional 
men in adherence to God, while the whole world around 
them was given to idolatry. Little these individuals knew, 
little could they know, of doctrines to inform, or principle 
to guide, or even of reasons to give for their acts, further 
than that God had spoken and called them to act. Such 
were the circumstances of the men whom we are here con- 
sidering; and in forming our judgment of them, it should 
have reference to their position and their opportunities for 
information. Indeed, if we compare our obedience in con- 
nection with our means for knowledge, with their obedience 
in connection with their means for knowledge, we shall per- 
haps wonder that they did so well. 

We turn now to look at this solitary traveller as he jour- 
neys on, full of thought ; for his life had been one adapted 
to cultivate much thinking and deep and sober feelings. 
We imagine his thoughts ; now eddying around his angry, 
sternly-resolved brother ; now by the bedside of his blind, 
sad father ; now resting on his mother with a gush of pre- 
cious remembrances ; and now striding far off before him and 
trying to make out something of his future at Haran. His 
mind amid all this, also, felt darkly around for God ; darkly, 
for how could he know ? or how see clearly ? or how form 
any other than confused notions of God ? With his appre- 
hensions so dim, as respected doctrine or duty, or even the 
sure lines of rectitude, or true principle for action, he was 
however wishing to look to God, and willing to be led. 
What other leader had he now ? He was alone in the world. 



156 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

Thus he journeyed on, passing Hebron and by Moriah ; 
in the evening he came to Bethel, the high ground 
noted already in this book as the place where Abraham 
had twice encamped, and where he and Lot had sepa- 
rated. Here Jacob paused for the night, — probably his 
second night from home, — as Bethel is distant from Beer- 
sheba about fifty-five miles. Preparations for a night's rest 
are still easily made in that country ; the girdle of cloth or 
leather unclasped, and rolled together and laid on some 
stones, and the simlahj an oblong piece of cloth for a cover- 
ing, being all that is deemed necessary as a preparation ; the 
earth offering itself as a sufficiently soft couch. So Jacob, 
after his light supper, laid down for needed rest. 

We have just been trying to follow his thoughts, and 
have seen the solitary man feeling his loneliness in the 
world, and querying about God. And as he was lying on 
that hill-top, in the deep silence of night, with the stars 
looking down upon him and seeming to have such abundant 
companionship among themselves, he might indeed feel 
lonely, and he might ask whether he was seen of God ? or 
would have help from God ? 

He slept soon, and there was a dream that might well be 
considered an answer to such thoughts. It was adapted to 
his simple apprehension ; for there was a raised ladder before 
him that reached to heaven, and on it angels were passing 
to and fro between the heaven and the earth. And then, as 
he looked, " Behold, the liord stood above it, and said, I 
am the Lord God of Abraham thy father, and the God of 
Isaac ; the land wherein thou liest, to thee will I give it, 
and to thy seed. And thy seed shall be as the dust of the 
earth ; and thou shalt spread abroad to the west, and to the 
east, and to the north, and to the south ; and in thee and in 
thy seed shall all the families of the earth be blessed. And 
behold, I am with thee, and will keep thee in all places 
whither thou goest, and will bring thee again into this land: 



JACOB IN EXILE, 157 

for I will not leave thee, until I have done that which I 
have spoken to thee of/' 

He waked from his dream and said, " Surely the Lord is 
in this place ; and I knew it not/' He gazed about him. 
There were again around him the dim forms of earthly ob- 
jects, and above him the dark vault of night ; the ladder 
was gone, and the angels were no longer seen, nor God heard ; 
but he felt now that the space around him was peopled with 
spirits, and that God was looking on him kindly, and was 
also not far off. So now, in that deep stillness, an awe came 
upon him, compelling from him the utterance, " How holy ^ 
is this place ! This is none other but the house of God, 
and this is the gate of heaven.'' "When the earliest morn- 
ing light came he rose, and placing on end the stone which 
had been his pillow, he poured oil on it according to a cus- 
tom by which they dedicated such spots to divine worship, 
and offered inducement to the Being thus invoked to make 
his especial residence there. He called the place Bethel, 
{Beth, a house, and El, God), and we hear him then in a 
vow, which many a one since, when going on uncertain 
enterprises, has been ready to repeat, '^ If God will be with 
me, and will keep me in the way that I go, and will give me 
bread to eat and raiment to put on, so that I come again to 
my father's house in peace ; then shall the Lord be my God; 
and this stone, which I have set for a pillar, shall be God's 
house ; and of all that thou shalt give me, I will surely give 
the tenth unto thee." 

We observe him now with deeply increased interest, as 
he goes forward on his journey ; for we feel that there is an 
especial Presence with him more distinctly marked, and a 
more conspicuous interest in him by the angels ; he was not 
solitary, though his human eyes did not any longer see those 
watchful forms. Yet he was only a man, and a weak, and 



1 'Y\\Q Hebrew word means /ea7/i^, worthy of reverence^ holy, 
14 



158 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT, 

as we have seen, an erring, man; but he was wishing to serve 
God, and the Deity through that wish was accepting him 
and was keeping him for great and wonderful purposes. 

His course thence was, doubtless, along the way by which 
Abraham had come from Haran to Shechem ; that is, by 
Damascus, then through the sandy region to the rich plains 
by the Euphrates, and across that stream to the forks of its 
tributary, the Belik, which brought him to the neighborhood 
of his relatives. He saw, on arriving there, some flocks 
lying by a well, waiting to be watered, and on inquiring of 
their keepers to what place they belonged, they replied to 
Haran. He asked, 

" Know ye Laban, the son of Nahor ?'^ 

" We know him.^^ 

" Is he well r 

'' He is well, and behold, Rachel, his daughter, cometh 
with the sheep.^' 

^^ Lo, it is yet high day, neither is it time that the cattle 
should be gathered together ; water ye the sheep and go and 
feed them,'^ he said, for he would have preferred that the 
first meeting between his cousin and himself should have 
been without so many spectators. They replied, according 
to the rule for watering in that country, where all must be 
entitled to a proper share, 

" We cannot until all the flocks be gathered together and 
till they roll the stone from the welTs mouth ; then we 
water the sheep." 

Rachel, the keeper of her father's flocks, was seen ap- 
proaching. She was very beautiful. Jacob gazed, and his 
eyes drank in the beauty of her face, the gracefulness of her 
movements, the lively but modest expression of her counte- 
nance, the elegance, as it appeared to him, of lier form. He 
seems to have been in love at the first sight. Nor was she 
less struck by his ready gallantry ; for he hurried to the 
well, rolled the stone from its mouth, and watered her sheep. 



JACOB IN EXILE, 159 

Then he kissed her, and " lifted up his voice and wept/^ It 
was such a blessed termination to his journey ! — this beauti- 
ful girl, and this meeting her where she needed help, and 
where he had such a favorable opportunity of introducing 
himself by a kindness which she could not but receive. We 
may believe too that it was very pleasantly received. He 
told her then who he was and his relationship to her ; and 
she hurried off to communicate the intelligence to her father. 
His uncle on the introduction was also pleased with the 
young man, who we may believe was of good personal ap- 
pearance ; for he came from a handsome stock, certainly at 
least on his mother^s and grandmother's side. 

Jacob was soon made to feel at home in the family ; and 
at the end of a month's hospitality, his uncle Laban pro- 
posed to hire him, and asked him what wages he would re- 
quire. There could be only one answer to the question : — 
lie asked for Rachel. She had a sister Leah, but Rachel had 
been his first love, and she was also the more beautiful of the 
two. It was customary then, as it still is, in those countries, 
to pay for a wife ; and the suitor in this case, a refugee 
from home, where he had escaped, probably by stealth, from 
Esau, had nothing to give but labor. The father of the 
girl, — a hard, selfish man, saw the strength of the suitor's 
affection, and imposed severe terms — a service of seven 
years, at the end of which time Rachel, Laban said, should 
be his. Jacob agreed to it, and took charge of the sheep. 
We are told, however, that the seven years " seemed unto 
him but a few days, for the love that he bore to her." 
Doubtless Rachel was not willing to give up her former 
employment, and often went out to assist him in the care of 
the flocks. The flocks, too, increased very greatly under 
Jacob's care, and would soon need additional help. The 
employment, though requiring care, was not severe, and 
allowed plenty of leisure. The beautiful plains sprinkled, 
most of the year, with a rich carpet of flowers ; the resources 



i6o LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT, 

of music on the wide pasture-grounds or in Laban's house ; 
and the pleasant intercourse of lovers ; all this would well 
make time pass agreeably to persons situated as Jacob and 
the beautiful Rachel were. But, as the end of the seven 
years approached, Laban^s hard selfishness began to resolve 
itself into a plot against the two young people and for his 
own advantage. Formerly he had not been as prosperous 
as the branch of the family in Canaan/ and his possessions 
had been small ; but since Jacob's arrival he had fast been 
growing into wealth, as wealth was there estimated ; there- 
fore he determined to cheat the young man into another 
service of seven years. We may believe that he would feel 
slighter compunctions about it after learning from Jacob's 
own lips, in the frequent evening home-narratives, how the 
latter had procured the birth-right and the father's blessing 
intended for his brother. Treachery to Jacob now would 
only be paying him back after his own way. So when the 
seven years were passed, and Jacob had claimed his bride, 
and the marriage feast, to which " all the men of the place" 
were invited, had been made, and the bride had been de- 
livered, the son-in-law found, next morning, that Leah had 
been substituted in his tent for Rachel, and had become his 
bride. 

The scene of anger and reproaches in the general family, 
and of meek shame on the part of Leah, need not be dwelt 
upon here. The reason given by Laban, — that it was not 
the custom of the country to give the younger daughter be- 
fore the first-born, — had to be received, whether satisfactory 
or not; and his proposai to give Rachel now, on condition 
of seven years' further service, was accepted ; and the latter 
also became Jacob's wife. 

Thus seven additional years were passed, attended not 
only with a rapid increase in Laban's flocks, but also to the 



* Compare Gen. xxx. 30 with Ibid xxvi. 14. 



JACOB IN EXILE, i6i 

same degree in Jacobus family. For each of his two wives 
had offered him her female servant as concubine, and to 
these children were also born, as well as to the wives; 
so that, at the end of this time, Jacob was the father of 
eleven sons and one daughter; the former named, according 
to the order of their birth, Eeuben, Simeon, Levi, Judah, 
Dan, Naphtali, Gad, Asher, Issachar, Zebulun and Joseph,^ 
the last being up to this time the only child of Rachel. He 
said now to Laban, " Send me away, that I may go unto 
mine own place, and to my own country ;^^ and indeed he 
had reason to be tired of his selfish father-in-law, who had 
kept him strictly to his bargain of service, and thus pecuni- 
arily poor, while Laban had seen his own wealth constantly 
growing under Jacob's judicious care. " Give me my wives 
and children,'^ said the latter, now, "for whom I have 
served thee, and let me go ; for thou knowest my service 
which I have done thee.^' But the shrewd father-in-law 
was not willing to part with him so readily, and proposed 
to hire him, leaving to his own choice the manner of receiv- 
ing his wages. The offer was accepted, Jacob choosing all 
in the flocks which were, or in future might be, naturally 
marked after a certain manner, intending, by a method 
which he had seen or heard of, to secure to himself the 
largest number and the best in the increase of the sheep and 
goats. We leave to naturalists to determine whether his 
method was philosophical or not ; but the fact soon became 
evident that the rule to which Laban had agreed was very 
rapidly multiplying his son-in-law's portion with the best 
and strongest in the flocks, while his own showed no increase 



1 The names were given by Jacob's wives, and are all significant. Eeu- 
ben means, Behold^ a son ; Simeon, hearing , i. e., God had heard her, be- 
cause she was slighted ; luevi, joined ; Judah, a confessor, one who acknow- 
ledged God ; Dan, judging ; Naphtali, my ivrestling ; Gad, prosperity ; Asher, 
blessedness; Issachar, wages; Zebulun, dwelling; Joseph, adding, A daugh- 
ter, tlie only one, was called Dinah, judgment. 
14* 



l62 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

in numbers, and those which came to him were sickly and 
weak. Jacob had taken care to select the pasture-ground.^ 
for his own people at three days' journey from those of La- 
ban, foreseeing that difficulties would probably arise, where 
there must be so much cause for jealousies and complaints 
between the two. Six years under this new system of wages 
saw a great change in the condition of the younger man. 
He had " increased exceedingly, and had much cattle and 
maid-servants and man-servants and camels and asses.'^ The 
prosperous are always admired ; adherents gathered to him, 
and he was becoming a sheikh of consequence among those 
pastoral tribes. 

Such a state of things between the two could not last 
much longer. Laban's sons were heard muttering, " Jacob 
hath taken away all that which was our father's ; and of 
that which was our father's hath he gotten all this glory ;'^ 
and he saw the countenance of Laban, always hard in its 
selfishness, darkening toward him more and more. 

A divine intimation that it was time to return to Canaan, 
and that he would be protected from above in such efforts, 
now came to him, and brought matters to a quick decision. 
He had need of such a promise to cheer him ; for difficulties 
were around him and must also meet him on the way. He 
had left his brother at home bent on his destruction, 
and he would have, in that country, to meet dangers the 
extent of which he now was unable to judge. He had es- 
caped at that time because he was alone ; but he had now a 
large family, and was encumbered by a numerous retinue, 
and had flocks that might well excite Esau's cupidity, and 
sharpen the desire for violence and blood. Here, his father- 
in-law was scowling upon him, and his wives' brothers were 
growing into a jealousy and fierceness that only wanted a 
good excuse for stri])ping him of j)ossessions to which they 
believed they had the greater right ; they might easily find 
coadjutors in that country in deeds of violence or blood, 



i 



JACOB IN EXILE, 163 

if plunder could be obtained. Jacob did not belong to that 
country ; his retainers were bound to him only by interest, 
and would probably desert him in any emergency of peril. 
Dangers were threatening him, whether in the alternative to 
go or stay ; but here they were getting every day to be more 
pressing, and God had moreover promised him protection in 
Canaan. But how was he to escape from this place without 
bringing about an open rupture and a catastrophe ? His fac- 
ulty in stratagem again came to his relief. He waited until 
the shearing- time had come, when Laban, with his sons, he 
knew, was busy with his sheep at home. There was a three 
days' journey between Jacob's flocks and those of his father- 
in-law. The former now called his two wives to the field, 
where there could be a secret consultation without danger 
of being overheard, and said, 

" I see your father's countenance that it is not toward 
me as before; but the God of my father hath been with 
me ;" and he went on to recapitulate the transactions be- 
tween him and Laban. They replied, 

" Is there yet any portion or inheritance for us in our 
father's house ? Are we not counted of him strangers ? He 
hath sold us, and hath quite devoured also our money. 
For all the riches which God hath taken from our father, 
that is ours and our children's ; now then, whatsoever God 
hath said unto thee, do." 

Preparations for a sudden flight for Canaan were there- 
fore immediately and stealthily made. Among their own 
domestic goods which his wives took care to secure, Rachel, 
without Jacob's knowledge, concealed also the teraphim 
(penates) or household gods of her father. Laban's family 
were doubtless to some extent idolaters ; and we may won- 
der that Jacob, in his twenty years' familiar intercourse with 
them, was not himself infected by their example. The 
images in this case appear to have been the small idols or 
figures in human shape of which we have notice in other 



164 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

parts of Scripture;^ and Rachel may, in addition to her 
wish to possess them for her own use, have been anxious to 
keep from her father the means which she probably thought 
they might aflPord him of gaining, by consulting them, a 
knowledge of their purpose and of the course in their flight. 




Teraphim or Household Idols. 

Jacob on this occasion would need the exercise of all his 
astuteness ; for such an act of secret departure would convey 
to the minds of others a consciousness in him of meditated 
wrong, and would readily form excuse for plundering him 
of all his hard-earned possessions. So he made his prepa- 
rations cautiously and secretly. His flocks and herds were 
quietly drawn together; and while he and his family re- 
mained behind, were probably moved some distance onward 
in the course ho was purposing to take — an act which would 
not necessarily create suspicion in a country where general 
movements to new pasturage were of frequent occurrence. 
Then, when the proper time had come, his wives and chil- 
dren were placed on camels fit for rapid and convenient 
motion, his domestic establishment was broken up, his tents 
were packed for quick transportation, and he took his course 



* See Judges xvii. 15 ; xviii. 14 and 20 ; 1 Sam. xix. 13 and 16 ; 2 Kings 
xziii. 24. 



JACOB IN EXILE. 165 

at once across the Euphrates and toward the southwest. 
It was not till the third day afterward that Laban, in the 
midst of his sheep-shearing, was informed of this abandon- 
ment of their home by his son-in-law and family. An ex- 
amination of the circumstances made the truth, at last, flash 
upon his mind ; a further investigation, probably an effort 
to consult his teraphim, led also to the discovery that his 
gods were missing. We may imagine the explosions of 
wrath which followed ; but there was little time for the in- 
dulgence of such feelings. He dropped all work at home, 
and having gathered a company of friends sufficient for 
aggressive movements, started in pursuit. The flying party 
had, however, used all possible expedition, and when on the 
seventh day of his endeavor to overtake them, he reached 
the outskirts of their flocks, they were already across the 
sandy wastes,^ and in the hilly country of the fertile region 
of Bashan. But, although he had the offenders now before 
him and their rich possessions were a most tempting sight, 
his hands were stayed. Just previous to this meeting, 
" God came to Laban, the Syrian, in a dream by night, and 
said unto him. Take heed that thou speak not to Jacob, 
either good or bad.^^ 

Whatever violence he may have meditated ; — for he had 
come with a retinue of his people sufficient for such pur- 
pose, — he was now restrained from any such action; but 
he let his fierce wrath take words. The scene is character- 
istic ; — the selfish man feeling himself despoiled, and glaring 
at the large flocks of Jacob with greedy eyes, but restrained 
by his dream ; his rage about the loss of his gods, who, stolen 
and concealed by these people, seemed to invite him to vio- 
lence; his vacillation between fear and anger; — the son-in- 
law cautious, but at last giving way to his long pent-up 
feelings, in which he felt that under the heavenly shelter he 
might now indulge. 

^^ What hast thou done,^^ said the despoiled man, " that 



l66 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT, 

thou hast stolen away unawares to me, and carried away my 
daughters, as captives taken with the sword? Wherefore 
didst thou flee away secretly, and steal away from me, and 
didst not tell me, that I might have sent thee away with 
mirth, and with songs, with tabret and with harp ? and hast 
not suffered me to kiss my sons, and my daughters ? Thou 
hast now done foolishly in so doing. It is in the power of 
my hand to do you hurt; but — '^ and he then mentioned how 
he had been warned by the dream. '' And now,^^ he contin- 
ued, " though thou wouldest needs be gone, because thou 
sore longest after thy father^s house, yet wherefore hast 
thou stolen my gods f-^ 

Jacob briefly answered, " Because I was afraid ; for I 
said, peradventure, thou wouldest take by force thy daugh- 
ters from me,^^ and then in his feeling of conscious innocence, 
said, " With whomsoever thou findest thy gods, let him not 
live ;'^ and invited him to a search. They were at this time 
encamped, each woman having her separate tent, and Laban 
searched those of Leah and the two concubines without suc- 
cess. Rachel had concealed the images beneath the couch on 
which she was reclining, and she gave reasons of delicacy for 
not rising, which he admitted ; and therefore the search in 
this tent was also futile. 

There had been a time of trepidation and great excitement, 
with wrath on both sides, held in but not subdued ; Jacob 
now let his burst forth. " What is my trespass V^ he sharply 
said ; " what is my sin, that thou hast so hotly pursued after 
me ? Whereas thou h^st searched all my stuff, what hast thou 
found of all thy household stuff? Set it here before my 
brethren, that they may judge betwixt us both. This 
twenty years have I been with thee ; thy ewes and thy she- 
goats have not cast their young, and the rams of thy flock 
have I not eaten. That which was torn of beasts, I brought 
not unto thee; I bore the loss of it; of my hand didst thou 
require it, whether stolen by day, or stolen by night. Thus 



JACOB IN EXILE. 167 

I was ; in the day the drought consumed me, and the frost 
by night ; and my sleep departed from mine eyes. Thus 
have I been twenty years in thy house ; I served thee four- 
teen years for thy two daughters, and six years for thy cattle, 
and thou hast changed my wages ten times. Except the 
God of my father, the God of Abraham, and the Fear of 
Isaac had been with me, surely thou hadst sent me away 
now empty. God hath seen mine affliction, and the labor of 
my hands, and rebuked thee yesternight.^^ 

Laban replied, '' These daughters are my daughters, and 
these children are my children, and these cattle are my cat- 
tle, and all that thou seest is mine ;'^ but, mortified, foiled, 
and, though deeply vexed, yet afraid of the supernatural 
protection and aid which he acknowledged to be about 
Jacob, he proposed a covenant between the latter and him- 
self. It was made, and a pile of stones thrown up was to be 
the future boundary beyond which neither was ever aggress- 
ively to pass, and also a witness against them should there 
be any future unrighteous dealing. Laban took care that 
these latter specifications should be altogether in his own 
favor ; but doubtless Jacob was quite content to escape so 
well. He offered sacrifice there, and made the company a 
feast; and on the morrow his father-in-law and party started 
toward their own home. To Laban, that return journey 
must have been a very gloomy one, — his goods, his children 
and grand-children, his profitable son-in-law, flocks, and 
much of his consequential position at Padan Aram, all 
stolen away. 



l68 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 



CHAPTER XVII. 
THE CRITICAL MEETING. 

THIS danger safely over, and the hill of stones erected as 
a boundary beyond which Laban^s resentment might not 
pass, Jacob could now advance more leisurely, as was indeed 
made necessary by the great fatigues of the recent flight. 
He was in a very fertile country, abounding in water as well 
as grass ; and if his mind had been easy, he could now have 
gazed with very great satisfaction upon his flocks and herds 
and family, and the rich possessions of the man who had, 
when escaping from home, travelled this road alone, his 
worldly goods consisting then of only his staff* and scrip. 

But his mind was not at ease. There was another dan- 
ger, perhaps much worse than the other, still to be met. 
Inquiries made during the time in which he was delaying, 
perhaps for months, in this region, and indeed was advan- 
cing reluctantly enough, had made him aware that Esau was 
now in Edom, and was a powerful man, with retainers 
enough to do great mischief to the younger brother and his 
party, if he should be so disposed. To this day a fondness 
for making raids for plunder, or for captives to be carried 
into slavery, is common among nomads, and we have seen 
that it was so in the days of Abraham. Esau and his men 
would now have a ready excuse for such an attack on Jacob 
and his company. 

It was a very anxious time with the latter. What Esau's 
feelings now were it was impossible for them to say. He had, 
twenty years before, been rash and impulsive and reckless ; 
time might have softened him, but he had then considered 
himself as having a grievous wrong to avenge, and feuds 
among j)a8toral tribes are proverbially lasting as well as bit- 



THE CRITICAL MEETING. 169 

ter. At Beersheba, if the two brothers should again meet 
there, every object would be adapted to awaken old resent- 
ments. Jacob saw now that it would be better to meet his bro- 
ther at once and know the worst, inasmuch as here he would 
be in a condition to fly with at least a part of his household 
and possessions, if threatened by any very serious danger. 

But he chose, first, the very judicious measure of sending 
messengers to his brother, with a frank statement respecting 
his residence during these twenty years, and the success at- 
tending his labors. He made it manifest that he was not 
coming home as an unfortunate, needy adventurer^ ready to 
swallow up what was remaining there ; but that he had 
abundant possessions of his own. The message ended with 
conciliatory language couched in the usual courteous style be- 
longing to the time and place ; ^' I have sent to tell my lord, 
that I may find grace in thy sight.'^ 

Edom was about seventy miles south of the place where 
Jacob was now staying, which was along the banks of the 
Jabbok, one of the two large tributaries of the Jordan on 
the west. At this spot angels appeared to him ; how, is not 
mentioned, but he named the place after them, Malianaim^ 
"hosts.^^ 

His messengers went, saw Esau, and returned. The 
account they brought to Jacob was astounding ; Esau was 
coming to meet him, attended by four hundred men! 

It seemed evident to every one that only violence could 
be intended by such a large retinue as this. There was uni- 
versal alarm. All were looking to Jacob ; and he was car- 
rying in his heart the knowledge of a deception practised by 
him against this brother, by which Esau might feel himself 
justified in any acts of revenge. The whole company must 
be resist! essly in the power of the approaching host. In- 
deed, if there were no other punishment coming, the twenty- 
four intervening hours of such feelings as he had now while 
looking at the helpless beings under his care, and who 

15 



r/O LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT, 

might all be doomed to sufferings for his sake, were bitter 
amends for his wrong act. The retribution had come, in- 
deed had been in some measure with him, ever since his 
deed by his father's bed-side. He had been an exile ; the 
deceiver at Beersheba had been deceived at Haran ; the tri- 
umph over his brother was turned into humiliation now, 
which was to be completed in the utter prostration of spirit 
before that brother. 

In deep sorrow and dread he made his dispositions for 
the coming meeting with Esau and his hosts. He divided 
his own company and possessions into two parts, and said, 
^' If Esau come to the one company, and smite it, then the 
other company which is left shall escape.'^ Then he raised 
his voice to Jehovah in prayer : 

'' O God of my father Abraham, and God of my father 
Isaac, the Lord which saidst unto me. Return unto thy 
country, and to thy kindred, and I will deal well with thee ; 
I am not worthy of the least of all the mercies, and of all 
the truth, which thou hast showed unto thy servant ; for 
with my staff I passed over this Jordan, and now I am be- 
come two bands. Deliver me, I pray thee, from the hand 
of my brother, from the hand of Esau ; for I fear him, lest 
he will come and smite me, and the mother with the chil- 
dren. And thou saidst, I will surely do thee good, and 
make thy seed as the sand of the sea, which cannot be num- 
bered for multitude.'' 

On the next morning he prepared a present well adapted 
to appease Esau ; namely, — two hundred and twenty goats, 
as many sheej), thirty milch-camels and their foals, fifty 
cattle, twenty she-asses and ten foals ; and putting each 
kind by itself, with an interval between and servants to 
attend thorn, he sent them forward to meet his brother. 
The attendants to each division were to say, in answer to 
inquiries by Esau, ^^ They be thy servant Jacob's; it is a 
present sent unto my lord Esau ; and behold, also he is be- 



THE CRITICAL MEETING. 171 

hind us/' The object was not only seasonably to make a 
favorable impression on his brother, but to get also a timely 
indication of what would be the disposition toward his own 
party. In those countries when a present is accepted the 
friendship of the receiver is secured ; to reject it is a clear 
sign of enmity and intended hostility. 

The following night Jacob sent his remaining company 
over the Jabbok by one of its fords/ and he remained 
behind for solitary prayer. Evidently the crisis of his life 
had come. He would not have needed to fear the danger 
so much, if all this large company with him had not been 
involved in it also ; for his whole history shows him to have 
been a man of affectionate disposition ; and now to the 
thought that wives and children might suffer, was the added 
reflection that the occasion was of himself. Borne down in 
heart and spirit, in his solitude by night he wept^ as he 
prayed. An angel came to his side during the prayer, and 
then in his earnestness to have an assurance of help where 
only it could be given, he seized on the heavenly messenger 
and struggled to detain him until such assurance would be 
given. Prayers and tears seemed not to have availed, for 
the angel tried to make him relax his hold, and by a touch 
withered^ the strength of the struggling man; but the 
latter held still, as far as he might. 

"Let me go," said the angel, '^ for the day breaketh." 

" I will not let thee go except thou bless me." 

He prevailed. The deep agony of the prayers and tears 

and the clinging earnestness shown in the bodily struggle 

maintained even in pain and weakness, had their reward. 

The angel said, " Thy name shall be called no more Jacob, 



^ It is evident from what follows that he sent them to the northern side 
of the river, while he remained on the south bank in the direction of 
Esau. The river is represented by the traveller Buckingham as ten yards 
wide, and deep and rapid. 

2 Compare Hosea xii. 4. ' See Gen. xxxii. 25. 



172 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT, 

but Israel ; ' for as a prince hast thou power with God, and 
with men, and hast prevailed,''^ The angel then blessed 
him. The humiliations and the fearful agony seem to have 
been an expiation for the sin of the supplanter^ and another 
name was given him. But, for the sake of distinction, the 
name Jacob is still continued to him in the Scriptures, while 
Israel is the term applied to his descendants. 

In the morning, as the sun was rising, he crossed the 
stream back to his companions. He was lame, still halting 
from the shrinking of a sinew ^ touched by the angel in his 
struggle, but his heart shared fully the brightness of the 
morning. Such struggle as had been his through the night 
is often still the experience of mortals in doubts and agonies, 
from which they come forth with hearts purified and strength- 
ened and a feeling that God^s blessing has been secured. 

He now divided his household into three companies, put- 
ting the '^ handmaids and their children foremost, and Leah 
and her children after, and Rachel and Joseph hindermost." 
He himself preceded them. Esau was understood to be 
near at hand. As soon as he came into view, and while he 
was approaching, Jacob ^^ bowed himself to the ground seven 
times until he came near to his brother, and Esau ran to. 
meet him, and embraced him, and fell on his neck, and 
kissed him ; and they wept.^' 

The three companies of his household were now success- 
ively brought up, and made to Esau the usual Eastern salu- 
tations. He inquired the meaning of the droves which he 
had met, and was informed that they were intended as a gift, 
which, on its being pressed upon him, he accepted, and then 
proposed that they should journey onward together. Jacob, 
however, urged that the children and his flocks were tender 



^ From 7^'^\£f Sarahy to contend, to struggle^ and ^x El, God, 
2 The Scriptures say tliat "the children of Israel eat not of the sinew 
which shrank, which is npon the hollow of the thigh, unto this day ;" a 
custom which, the author is informed, they continue to our time. 



JACOB IN CANAAN. 173 

and must need rest and a slower kind of advance ; and 
then, on his brother's offering to leave some of his men in 
company, he excused himself also from that. '' What needeth 
it?'' he said. '' Let me find grace in the sight of my Lord." 
So Esau and his party left him and returned to Edom. 

It was clearly a great relief to Jacob and his party to 
have them depart. 



CHAPTER XVIII. 
JACOB IN CANAAN. 

JACOB was now about ninety-seven years of age, his 
youngest son, Joseph, six ; and his father, Isaac, still 
living, had advanced to the great age of one hundred and 
fifty-seven years. 

The Israelite company, after Esau's departure, moved on- 
ward along the banks of the Jabbok, and found attractions 
sufficient in one of these spots to induce them to erect 
booths, or temporary houses, whence the place took its name 
of Succoth. Advancing thence onward, where now that 
stream took a more southerly course they left it, and cross- 
ing the Jordan, made their encampment on the large plain 
of Shechem, where Abraham, on his way from the Eu- 
phrates, had pitched his tent. Here is a well still going by 
Jacob's name, and which tradition says was dug by him, 
which is probably correct ; for he must have remained here 
seven or eight years, as we infer from the ages requisite 
for his children in the events detailed in Gen. xxxiv. 
This well, which is assigned to him by all travellers, even 
the most skeptical respecting localities, is seventy-five feet 
deep, and about nine in diameter; and is nearly opposite the 
rich valley of Shechem, here commencing between the 

15* 



174 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

mounts Gerizim and Ebal, and stretching in great beauty 
and fertility toward the west. He purchased here "^ parcel 
of a field, where he had spread his tent, at the hand of Ha- 
mor, Shechem's father, for an hundred pieces of money, 
and he erected an altar, and called it El-Elohe-Is^^adj ' the 
God of Israel/ '' 

The young prince, Shechem, became enamored of Jacobus 
daughter, — his youngest child, — and his father offered that, 
if she might be given in marriage, the land should be before 
them for any occupancy which they might desire. '^ Dwell 
ye and trade ye therein,'^ he said, ^^and get ye possessions 
therein.'^ It was a liberal offer, for the valley of Shechem 
has always been considered the garden spot of Palestine. 

The son also offered any dowry that they might require. 
But he had already committed a great crime in the case of 
the young girl, which Jacob's two oldest sons, — whose full 
sister she was, — felt could only be expiated by blood ; and 
they formed a treacherous plot which, successfully carried 
out, through the strong love of the young men, enabled them 
to sate their revenge. They slew Hamor and Shechem and 
the other men of the city, and plundered the houses, carry- 
ing off the women and children, and all possessions in the 
city and fields as booty. Jacob, when made conscious of 
this, trembled for the result; for it might lead to a league 
in all the country against such an apparently bloodthirsty 
race. The sister of the young men was restored from She- 
chem 's house, to which she had been taken ; but she was 
brought back covered with shame ; and all felt themselves 
disgraced. To Jacob's reproaches on the two sons, they re- 
plied boldly and strongly, trying to justify themselves. 

Great troubles had thus came into eJacob's own house- 
hold, and he had reason to search in deep liumiliation, and 
see whether there was not infidelity to God among them all, 
as well as a spirit of cruelty growing up among his sons. 
There was need not only for such scrutiny, but probably 



JACOB IN CANAAN. 1 75 

also for self-condemnation as regarded himself; for his favor- 
ite wife had concealed the teraphim belonging to her father, 
stolen from home ; and if he had not approved her act, still 
he seems finally to have suffered the images to remam. 
There were, at all events, false gods in the camp. The spirit 
of idolatry in those countries was penetrating and pervading, 
and kept its hold even in such a family as this. 

He was now directed by the divine authority to proceed 
southwardly to Bethel ; and at the thought of this place 
there came before him very vividly, not only his beautiful 
night dream of the angels ascending and descending, and of 
God above them giving his words of comfort, but also the 
promise he had made there, that if God would keep and 
bless him, then the Lord should be his God. Had he been 
faithful to this promise, as God had been faithful and true 
to him? He determined that his company should go to 
this sacred place at Bethel with pure hands ; he therefore 
said, " Put away the strange gods that are among you, and 
be clean and change your garments ; and let us arise and go 
up to Bethel ; and I will make there an altar unto God who 
answered me in the day of my distress, and was with me in 
the way which I went.^^ They brought him their gods and 
also their ear ornaments, and he hid them under an oak in 
the plain ; and then the company began their movement 
toward Bethel, which was distant twenty-five miles. When 
they arrived there, he erected an altar; and here God 
appeared to him once more, and reassured him with pro- 
mises of blessings and ctf large increase and glory among 
his posterity. A stone pillar was erected in commemoration 
of this event, and oil and a drink-offering poured upon it 
in order to make it sacred. 

During his residence at Shechem he had visited his 
father, as we may infer from the fact that Deborah, his 
mother's nurse, was with him now at Bethel. His mother 
herself appears not to have been living ; and this aged nurse 



176 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

was a precious link between him and the parent who had 
been to him so tender and so devoted as even to be willing 
to take the father's curse for his sake. At Bethel he was 
called upon to mourn the loss of Deborah^ who died there, 
and who was buried with such marks of grief that the tree 
under which she was interred received the name of Allon-- 
bachuth, '^ the oak of weeping." 

Deaths in the domestic circle are thought seldom to come 
alone, and Jacob was soon after this overwhelmed with a 
terrible calamity, — the loss of Rachel, the most dearly be- 
loved in all his family group. He had left Bethel, and was 
moving his encampment southwardly, when a short time 
before coming to Ephrath (afterward Bethlehem), this wife 
became the mother of another son ; but in giving him birth, 
yielded up her own life. She had strength to name him 
Boi-oni, '' the son of my sorrow ;" but his father afterward 
called him Benjamin, " the son of my right hand.'' He 
erected a pillar there, which centuries afterward was yet re- 
maining as a memorial of the place of her interment :^ a 
small edifice of solid masonry with a dome, now standing 
on the right of the road from Jerusalem to Bethlehem, 
about two miles from the latter place, is considered by all 
travellers as still marking this spot. 

Isaac was, at this time, living in the neighborhood of 
Hebron. He was now about one hundred and sixty-six 
years old, infirm, and probably altogether blind. Jacob and 
his large retinue made their final settlement there, and his 
numerous flocks and herds found abundant pasturage in this 
fertile region. Fourteen years after this the father died, 
" and was gathered unto his people, being old and full of 
days." Usau came over from Edom, and the two brothers 
deposited his remains in the cave of Machpelah. The older 
one had once determined on this event as that which was to 



Gen. XXXV. 20. 



JACOB IN CANAAN, 177 

let forth his revengeful fury upon Jacob ; but his feelings 
had changed, and the younger brother, in his own great 
abundance was able now to let him have the patrimony 
long years before so recklessly sold for a mess of pottage. 
Esau made a final removal of all his possessions to Edom ; 
for the riches of the two " were more than that they might 
dwell together; and the land wherein they were strangers 
could not bear them, because of their cattle/^ 

Our attention is now altogether concentrated on Jacob, and 
we turn to look at him and his household here at Hebron. 

The sight is not a very pleasant one. He himself was 
still the same gentle, affectionate man as always ; and now 
more truthful and honest ; for his severe trials had toned 
down his character in this latter respect. We begin to have 
for him the reverential regard to which his age entitles him ; 
for he was now one hundred and seven years old. His pas- 
toral wealth had become ample ; there was abundance in his 
fields and in stores at home ; but his family matters were 
very far from being satisfactory. His ten oldest sons had 
now mostly arrived at man^s estate, and had grown up with 
such perversities of disposition as must be the consequence 
where there are so many mothers with jealousies and bick- 
erings, which no ruler of such a family can suppress. The 
young men were all getting to be violent and lawless. We 
have had occasion to record their murderous violence at 
Shechem; and subsequently the oldest of them, Reuben, 
was guilty of a sin similar to the one which had there 
whetted their revenge, but far worse in degree. 

But in this tent at home, there was to Jacob one very 
bright spot, although even this was the cause of anxieties, 
in consequence of the jealousies in the household. Joseph, 
his elder son by the favorite wife, seems to have partaken of 
her remarkable beauty.^ He was his father's favorite, and 



1 Compare Gen. xxxix. 6, with xxix. 17. 



178 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

was sprightly and happy in the boyish enjoyment of that 
favoritism ; and in it, he may unconsciously or consciously 
have made his lively repartees sometimes stinging to his 
envious brothers. Their envy became darkened into hatred, 
when they found, as they did presently, that he was report- 
ing their cases of bad conduct to his father. Bright, pleas- 
ant, joyous lad that he was, he could not dive into the 
depths of rancor beginning to be formed in their hearts to- 
ward hira, and which he increased very much, one day, by 
mentioning a dream which he had just had ; which was that 
they and he were in the field binding sheaves of grain, and 
that his sheaf rose and stood up, and all the others bowed 
before it, as in obeisance. 

^^ Shalt thou indeed reign over us? or shalt thou indeed 
have dominion over us V^ they cried, in scornful indignation ; 
and deeper venom was added to their hatred of the young 
aspirant. But worse was yet to come ; for he had another 
dream, even still more strangely significant, as it might 
be interpreted ; and he told it to them in the presence of the 
father. " Behold, ^^ he said, '^ I have dreamed a dream more ; 
and behold, the sun and the moon and the eleven stars 
made obeisance to me.^^ There came a rebuke from the 
father, but it was not very severe : " What is this dream 
that thou hast dreamed? Shall I and thy mother and thy 
brethren indeed come to bow down ourselves to thee to the 
earth V Probably, indeed, the father's tones were contra- 
dictory to his words, and showed increased satisfaction with 
his somewhat pert and spoiled favorite ; but in the mean 
time, under the comparatively calm faces around, were 
hearts stung, and boiling with rage. Jacob was already 
beginning to look through this dream to some great future 
for this boy. He remembered well the divine promises to 
his forefathers and to himself. His other sons were bad 
young men, and he was glad to see in this one, — the gift of 
his late beautiful, beloved Rachel, — the promise of qualities 



JACOB IN CANAAN. 179 

that might make him a suitable recipient for the wonderful 
blessings to come from God. In his gladness and joyous- 
ness of favor, he did a very unwise thing ; for he gave to 
Joseph a coat of many brilliant colors, which became to the 
others a perpetual, stinging reminder of the father^s par- 
tiality. 

They hdted the lad with increasing bitterness of hatred ; 
and they were glad when, after a while, they received direc- 
tions from Jacob to take part of the flocks back to the place 
which he had purchased by the well at Shechem, and to 
pasture them there. 

There was some danger in sending them to a region where 
they had once committed such excesses ; but time had some- 
what moderated the resentments in the neighborhood, and 
probably the young men thought themselves able to with- 
stand such feelings in a country where they had made so 
terrible an impression of their power. Indeed, when they 
had been formerly leaving the place, a terror of them con- 
nected with the superhuman was, we are informed, upon 
the cities in that region so great as to check any disposition 
toward pursuit.^ 

The ten sons went oif to Shechem with a portion of the 
flocks; and then, in a short time the father's heart began to 
be anxious concerning them, and he concluded to send 
Joseph to make inquiries and to bring him back word of 
their condition. We may wonder that he was willing to 
trust the lad in such company; but probably, with the 
cunning which deep-seated, revengeful feeling is apt to pro- 
duce, they had concealed their hatred of this son ; for in 
all the subsequent events Jacob appears never to have had 
a suspicion of any possibility of foul dealing on their part. 

Joseph was then seventeen years of age, active, lithe, 
bright and joyous, and in his gay dress '' of many colors,'^ 



1 Gen. XXXV. 5. 



l8o LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

was a sight to make the father's heart proud, as he presented 
himself ready for the journey and asked for directions and 
the parting blessing. How long it would be before the two 
would meet again ! and hoiv different the circumstances of the 
meeting ! 

Sheehem was fifty-six miles northward from Hebron. 
The lad reached the place in safety, but his brothers and the 
flocks were not there. He was wandering about searching 
for them, when he was informed by a stranger that they 
were probably at Dothan, which was about fifteen miles 
further northwardly, and to it he directed his steps. The 
brothers were there, and they recognized him at a distance, 
for his gay dress made him easily known ; — that dress, 
flaunting even here before them, a token of the father's 
partiality and reminder of scenes at home ! 

'' Behold, the dreamer cometh,'*' they cried as they saw 
him ; and the eyes of the young men meeting quickly as 
they turned toward each other, had in them an understood, 
deadly intent. It is said that the lion, when he has once 
tasted human blood, becomes by preference a man-eater; 
and these men, — some of them at least — had before this, 
made their hearts callous in scenes of carnage. The seeds 
of deadly feeling toward this young man had previ- 
ously been sown in their hearts; he had already been 
informer against them ; they looked upon him now as a spy 
come among them. It had previously needed but little to 
inflame them into a fatal purpose; the purpose was rapidly 
and almost simultaneously formed now ; he was there alone 
with them; how easy it would be to kill him and carry 
report to their father that he had been destroyed by a wild 
beast. That was their quickly-formed determination, but 
Reuben interfered. He had a plan for cheating the others 
and rescuing Joseph, and then delivering him to his father, 
perhaps as an expiation for a terrible outrage on the feelings 



JACOB IN CANAAN. l8l 

of the latter in the case of Bilhah,^ the concubine of Jacob. 
He therefore persuaded them, instead of killing their brother 
at once, to cast him into a pit, to leave him there to perish, 
as this would not be so obviously imbruing their hands in 
his blood. There was no water in the pit, and his own in- 
tentions were to come secretly afterward and rescue the lad. 

Joseph came on in the brightness and joyousness of un- 
suspecting youth, glad to have the uncertainty of search 
over by finding them at last, and glad in the meeting. He was 
startled by the fierceness of looks bent upon him ; he was 
seized ; his coat was quickly torn oflF him with violence ; 
there were few words from them, but these were deadly ; he 
saw their purpose; he raised an anguished cry ; he entreated ;^ 
but he was helpless in the hands of infuriated men, deaf to 
all cries and lashing their hearts up into fresh rage and 
bloodier sentiments of revenge. They dragged him to the 
pit and cast him in ; and then going off a sufficient distance, 
they sat down with such relish as they could have, to their 
customary meal. 

Reuben was absenting himself from them now. Fearful 
probably that his manner, if he were to remain among them, 
might betray his purposes, he had gone off to quite a dis- 
tant part of the grazing region, and was waiting there until 
the time for delivering his brother should come. 

But deliverance came in a manner unexpected by him. 
While the nine brothers were at their meal, they saw ap- 
proaching them a company of Ishmaelites, those restless 
wanderers over the country, sometimes nomads, sometimes 
traders, sometimes robbers, anything, indeed, that would 
accommodate itself to their fondness for a roving life. 
These men had spices from the region of Gilead,^ just east- 
ward from this across the Jordan, and were bound for a 



1 Gen. XXXV. 5. 2 gee Gen. xlii. 21. 

3 Gileacl was famous for its balsams. See Jer. viii. 22; xlvi. 11. 

16 



i83 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

market for their balsams in Egypt. As they were seen ap- 
proaching, Judah suggested to his brethren that it Avould 
be better to make money by selling the brother, instead of 
letting him die in the pit; and in addition to the prospect 
of gain, some relentings appear to have seized on him ; "for 
he is our brother," said Judah, ^' and our own flesh." The 
project was agreed to, and Joseph was drawn up and sold 
to the traders for twenty pieces of silver ; and he was soon 
moving with them in a direction that must carry him far 
from his home. 

Reuben, toward evening, returned to the pit ; he found 
it empty ! He rent his clothes in his extremity of distress. 
"The child is not," he cried ; "and whither shall I go?" 

There was still a terrible scene to be gone through by 
these guilty young men, and their hearts shrank from it 
with many misgivings. In the depths of their depravity 
they still had a reverence for their father, and they all could 
dread his curse. But a common interest now bound them to 
maintaining the lie which they had agreed upon, and they 
believed that they could trust each other in the bond of a 
common guilt. They killed a kid, and having dipped the 
gay garment of their brother in its blood, carried it to the 
tent at Hebron. Their words, on presenting themselves 
before their father, were few and cold and seem heartless ; 
perhaps they dared not trust their guilty feelings to a longer 
address. 

"This we have found," they said ; "know now wlictlKM- 
it be thy son's coat or no." 

A start of horror ; a look of recognition on the garment ; 
a pang of agony at the sight of blood ; — and the seeming 
truth was all revealed ! 

For many days he sat, all encased in his horror; days and 
nights were equal to him in their frightful gloom. " It is 
my son's coat; an evil beast hath devoured him ; Joseph is 
without doubt rent in pieces," he kept saying ; — his own 



EGYPT, 183 

garments rent now, and sackcloth upon him ; all his chil- 
dren around trying to comfort him, but in vain. 

'' I will go down into the grave unto my son mourning/^ 
he muttered, in reply to all their attempts to console him ; 
" I will go down into the grave unto my son mourning/^ 
Even the little child, given by his Rachel at the cost of her 
life, failed to bring him relief in his sorrow ; its gentle, 
sprightly ways jarred harshly on him ; he wanted no relief. 
His sons, with that guilty secret in them, stood around, 
silent, or essaying words of sympathy. Words and silence 
were alike to him. 



CHAPTER XIX. 
EGYPT, 



IN the mean while, the lad was on his way toward Egypt 
in company with his owners, and had his own griefs 
without any friends near him and without sympathy. 
Young people sometimes grow old in a few hours ; and his 
recent experiences had been of a character to teach him a 
vast deal in a single point of time. Those flashing eyes, the 
concentrated wrath and inhumanity in those faces of his 
brothers, their stinging words in answer to his supplications, 
their cold, pitiless observance of his tears, their fury and 
determination, and then the conviction in his mind that all 
was hopeless, and that he, the helpless boy, was to be bru- 
tally murdered by those who should have been his best pro- 
tectors, — all this had been burnt into his soul, and left there 
its mark of hissing fire. It is not to be wondered, if 
this searing process reached also in some degree his affections 
for his father ; for the perception of the father's indiscretion 



184 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT, 

in his partiality, carried so far as to send him off in this 
gay robe, rose now clearly before him, and he felt that a 
wrong had been done him even by this doting parent. To 
pet a child is always the surest way to make him selfish, 
exacting and inconsiderate of others ; and this process had 
for years been going on in Joseph's heart. But a cruel blow 
had come. He awoke from its first stunning effects to find 
himself a slave, alone, without sympathy from others ; but 
he was also a far wiser young man as regarded all the world 
and especially himself. 

Their route lay transversely across the hill country, south 
and west of Dothan, and then to the great plain bordered 
by the Mediterranean ; and thence on it, toward the south. 
As they travelled along, they had, at the end of a 
few days, on their left, the loftier table-land, amid which 
were embosomed the tents and the households where 
Joseph's father and the little Benjamin were living ; and 
where, he thought, his brutal, older brothers might be now 
with their false tales. Feelings of affection for the loving 
parent filled the boy's eyes and made them overflow ; and 
yet with them was mingled some sentiment of condemna- 
tion toward the indiscreet cause of all these sufferings. 
Perhaps, in his new distrust of all men, he queried whether 
the absent boy would not soon be forgotten by all at home? 
At all events, that home was to him now a shut-off world. 

The lad soon began to look bravely to the future, and to 
prepare himself for the new world of which he was to be a 
part. He had the hopefulness always belonging to youth ; 
he was good-looking, and had a bright, quick intellect; he 
was in a situation to impress discretion, and had just been 
through a lesson in which the want of it had been terribly 
shown. He determined to be cautious, prudent, watchful, 
and hopeful ; what was best of all, he resolved to adhere to 
the God of his forefathers, respecting whom, his notions, it 
is true, were dark ; but yet were sufficient to satisfy him that 



EGYPT, 185 

this Divine Being was a powerful helper to those who 
trusted him. He resolved to be faithful to God ; then, he 
believed, he would have the Protector and Friend of whom 
he was now going to stand so much in need. 

So they travelled on over that dreary stretch of country 
between Canaan and Egypt ; and then they came, first to a 
few patches of grass, next to larger stretches of verdure; 
and finally, they had before them the seemingly intermi- 
nable green of the Delta, all one lovely plain of grass, till 
in the immeasurable distance sky and earth seemed to 
meet. 

We shall see probably in a future part of this book 
that in the hundred and ninety-three years since Abra- 
ham's visit to this country, the Hyksos had been expelled, 
and that the old Egyptian dynasties, once more restored, 
had now been about eighty-one years in the rulership 
of this country. The shepherd-kings, during the five 
hundred and eleven years of their possession of it, had 
seemingly, toward the last, slid gradually into many of the 
usages of the more refined, conquered people; so that, when 
the change of dynasties came, we may suppose that there 
was no great transition, except in the governing power, 
eloseph appears to have been brought into the country at the 
beginning of the reign of Tuthmosis III. (Tetmes, Ra-men- 
Kheper), the fifth sovereign of the new dynasties, an active 
and powerful king, whose great edifices are abundant even 
as far up as the second cataract of the Nile. 

The sovereigns were all called Pharaoh, from the god 
Phrah, signifying ^^ the sun,'' and were to their subjects the 
representative of the deity. They were considered the em- 
blems of the god of light ; their royal authority was believed 
to be directly from the gods, and these were supposed to 
communicate through them their choicest blessings to men. 
The king was the head of the religion of the state, was the 
judge and lawgiver, and commanded the army and led it to 



1 86 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT, 

war. It was his right to preside over the sacrifices and 
pour out libations to the gods, and whenever he was present, 
he had the privilege of being the officiating high priest. He 
was himself always of the military or the priestly class, and 
the princes also belonged to one of these classes.^ 

The course of our record brings us again among these re- 
markable people, and we shall have frequent occasion to 
notice their peculiar habits ; but, for the present, we simply 
accompany the young Joseph as he goes along, gazing, won- 
dering, himself and his company gazed at, and the subjects, 
as he soon perceived, of no very complimentary remark by 
the inhabitants. The reason of this last he discovered sub- 
sequently, when he came to know that every person in 
Egypt was shaved, — the head as well as face ; and that so 
particular were the Egyptians on this point that to have 
neglected it was a subject of reproach and ridicule; and 
that whenever they intended to convey the idea of a man of 
low condition, or a slovenly person, their artists represented 
him with a beard. If foreigners who were brought to Egypt 
as slaves had beards on their arrival, as soon as they were 
put to service among these people they were compelled to 
conform to the cleanly habits of their masters ; their beards 
and heads were shaved, and they adopted the close cap. 
The hair of the beards and heads of Egyptians was allowed 
to grow only in mourning, or in times of great misfortune, 
as a sign of distress.^ 

So the Hebrew lad, while staring at the close-shaven 
people along the way, with their bare heads quite exposed 
or covered with a close-fitting cap, was in return stared 
and sneered at; and again he saw that, strangely enough, 
while they shaved the beard, they wore false beards made of 
plaited hair, those of ])rivate individuals restricted exactly 
to two inches in length. That of the king, we know 



* See Wilkinson's "Ancient Egyptians." ^ ijjij. 



EG TFT. 



187 



was long and square : for the sculptured or painted gods it 
was turned up at the end ; after death, any one worthy of it 
might be represented with the turned-up beard, signifying 
that he had been absorbed into their deity. 




5 10 20 EngUsh Miles. 

Part of the Nile and its branches. 
1, Memphis. 2, The PjTamids. 3, Present City of Cairo. 4, The most sacred City of On, or 
Hara, the Heliopolis of the Greeks. 5, Pithom, and Raamses, the two Treasure-cities built by 
Ramesses II. His canal between them. 7, 7, Chief road to and from Canaan. 



There is not space here to notice the many strange sights 
constantly occurring and thickening along the way, as 
Joseph went on ; and we only accompany him along, near 
the wonderful pyramids and into the immense city of Mem- 
phis, whose suburbs began in the shadow of the pyramids, 
although the heart of it was not reached till eight miles 
further on. Arrived there, he was purchased by Potiphar, 
captain of the king's guard, and was taken to the palace of 
his new master, and his own head shaved. He wore also 
the dress of the Egyptians ; there was a complete metamor- 
phosis in his exterior ; but he was a youth of fine personal 
appearance, and in any costume would compare advantage- 
ously with his Egyptian companions. It is not to be in- 



i88 1 IFE SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

ferred that the heads were always left in this extreme sim- 
plicity of bareness, or of the close-fitting cap; for wigs 
were in common use amongst both men and women, and 
were often most elaborately and carefully made. The fol- 
lowing are from Wilkinson^s copies of Egyptian paintings, 
representing heads and head ornaments of Egyptians. 



Egyptian heads in the time of Joseph. 
{Brom Wilkinson's Ancient Egyptians.) 






Bare. 



With a wig. 



False beard of 
a private indi- 
vidual. 



False beard 
of a king. 



Beard sculp- 
tured on their 
gods. 



A head with a close cap is seen on p. 79. 



Joseph remained about ten years in Potiphar's house. 
The name of his master, as we have it on the monuments, 
Pet-Pa-Ra, or Pet-Ph-Ra,^ " belonging to the sun," shows 
us that the young Hebrew was here brought into close con- 
tact with the imposing religious systems of that country, 
well adapted to mystify and to enchant, to work upon the 
imagination and the outward senses, and, being in connection 
with what was evidently his worldly interest, also to en- 
snare his heart. 

The religion of the Egyptians, although entirely idola- 
trous, was of a much more refined, and, if we may use the 
word, spiritualized character than that which we have been 
looking at in Ur of the Chaldees. Both had their origin 
undoubtedly in the primitive true idea of God ; but while 
that of the Chaldees soon took the form of worshipping liira 
in what they considered his representatives, the sun and 



^ We have the name again with sliglit difference of orthography in the 
prieet of the sun, afterward Joseph's father-in-law, Pati-Ph-Ra, 



EGYPT, 189 

moon, and so finally into utter grossness and sensuality, 
this of the Egyptians began with deifying the qualities of 
God, as in Amun, tke Divine Mind in operation ; Neff, tlie 
Spirit of God ; Pthah, the creative power, &c. This was 
the beginning ; but it must be seen that a system which en- 
couraged and took pleasure in multiplying emblems as gods, 
would soon not only have an abundance of such objects of 
worship, but would become obscure by its own vastness of 
amplifications and its complications. ^^As the subtlety of 
philosophical speculation entered into the originally simple 
theory, numerous subdivisions of the divine nature were 
made ; and at length anything which appeared to partake of 
or bear analogy to it, was admitted to a share of the wor- 
ship. Hence arose the various grades of deities, and they 
were known as gods of the first, second and third orders.^^^ 
It was a polytheism in a pantheism ; but their religious system 
soon became so large and involved, and full of subtleties, 
that its secrets were known only to the priests, who took 
care to keep the knowledge of them confined to themselves. 
These, with the numerous religious observances, gave this 
order of men " that influence which they so long possessed ; 
but they had obtained a power which, while it raised their 
own class, could not fail to degrade the rest of the people ; 
who, allowed to substitute superstition for religion and cre- 
dulity for belief, were taught to worship the figures of im- 
aginary beings, while they were excluded from a real know- 
lege of the Deity, and those truths which constituted the 
wisdom of the Egyptians.'^^ 

One of the greatest of their gods, Osiris, one of whose 
titles was, " The manifester of good and truth,^^ had pro- 
bably his origin in the deification of the quality of good- 
ness in the Deity ; but to this idea of Osiris were so many 
adjuncts and myths as to make him one of the greatest mys- 



1 Wilkinson. 2 ibid. 



190 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 



teries of their religion. He was considered the judge of 
the dead ; and in this manner the belief of existence after 
death, which was universal in Egypt, was so closely con- 
nected with this god and with a vast number of impressive 
ceremonies, that when the great Jewish lawgiver came, two 
centuries after Joseph's time, to legislate for his own people, 
he could not touch on the subject of a future life without 
a continual steeping of their minds in remembrances of this 
god and probably also of reverence for him. Osiris was also 
said to have taught the Egyptians agriculture, and was 
therefore beloved as their greatest benefactor. His spirit 
was considered to reside in the bull Apis, because the ox 
was employed in tillage, and this bull, the outward repre- 
sentative of the god, was an object of reverence while living 
and \vas embalmed when dead.^ The calf Mnevis at On, 
the most sacred city in Egypt, " was also dedicated to Osiris 
and honored by the Egyptians with a reverence next to that 
paid to Apis, whose sire some pretend him to be." We 
shall see hereafter how the Israelites, when, even at the foot 
of Sinai they turned to idolatry, adopted for their wor- 
ship an image of the calf Mnevis, the representation of 
Osiris, judge of the dead. We cannot, indeed, wonder that 
after such an exhibition, Moses dared not give new entice- 
ments to this worship by strengthening his new laws witli 
the powerful motives that might have been deduced from 
the future existence of the soul. No part of the religious 
doctrines and observances in Egypt was drawn out with 
such particularity or invested with such reverential solemnity 
as those for the deceased. " The Book of the Dead," a 
papyrus manuscript, discovered by the French expedition in 



^ The Historical Society of New York is rich in the ownersliip of three 
of these wicrcd })nlls embahiicd and wrapped as nuimniies, part of the 
extremely vahiable P^gyptian collection purchased from II. Abbott, a suc- 
cefisful amateur collector. It is said that but one other mummy of this 
kind — now in the British Museum — has yet been discovered. 



EGYPT. 191 

the tombs of the kings of Thebes^ contains prayers, invoca- 
tions and confessions, to which the soul in its long journey 
through the celestial gates is giving utterance. Osiris, thus 
originally, it would seem, a deification of the quality of 
goodness in God ; then a god himself as the manifester of 
good and truth; then additionally made the judge of the 
dead ; and having his living spirit dwelling in Apis ; was 
apparently the most popular and honored of their numerous 
gods, as is indicated by the multiplication of his figure on 
all their structures. 

Miss Martineau, in her interesting account of a visit to 
that country, says of such sculptured representations : ^^ I was 
never tired of gazing at these Osirides everywhere, and try- 
ing to imprint indelibly on my memory the characteristics 
of the old Egyptian face. . . . Innocence is the prevailing 
expression, and sternness is not. Thus the stiffest figures 
and most monotgnous gestures convey still only an im- 
pression of dispassionateness and benevolence. The dignity 
of the gods and goddesses is beyon(f all description from 
this union of fixity and benevolence. . . . The Greek and 
Roman gods appear like wayward children beside them. 
Herodotus says that the Greek gods were children to these 
in respect of age (2, 4, 50, 58, 140), and truly they appear 
so in respect of wisdom and maturity. Their limitation of 
powers and consequent struggles, rivalries and transgres- 
sions, their fondness and vindictiveness, their anger, fear 
and hope, are all attributes of childhood, contrasted strik- 
ingly with the majestic, passive possession of power and the 
dispassionate and benignant frame of these ever-young, old 
deities of Egypt. Vigilant, serene, benign, they sit, teach- 
ing us to inquire reverently into the early powers and con- 
ditions of that Human Mind which was capable of such 
conceptions.^^ ^ 



1 '' Eastern Life." 



192 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 



CHAPTER XX. 
BEFORE THE KING, 

IF this Egyptian system of belief, made additionally im- 
pressive by its very grand architectural adjuncts, has in 
our own times an attractiveness sufficient to awaken great 
enthusiasm among scholars, who, however, soon lose their way 
among the fogs of its mysticisms, what must it have been 
as Joseph saw it, in the royal palaces with the king at its 
head and all his power employed in its support ! Nothing 
can be better adapted than it, even in its simplest forms, to 
impress the imagination and to beguile the judgment; but 
Joseph's imagination had been terribly sobered, and his 
judgment suddenly and strangely matur^ as nothing but 
such shocks as he had received can sober and mature; and 
he looked now with extremest caution and with penetrative 
acumen beyond his years on everything that he saw. He 
was helpless, dependent, a slave, and alone with that frightful 
aloneness when the heart is severed from everything on 
earth. No doubt that dream of his father, when at Bethel 
he had seen the ladder and the angels on it, and God above ; 
and the vow of this father to God; and the manner in 
which tlie Deity had in return blest and kept his parent, 
had been all told in the tent to this son ; and now came 
back to liim. If Joseph could have those bright angels 
about him and that God for his God, he need not fear and 
would never be truly helpless and alone. Such a religion 
was surely a far more blessed one, and more blessing, than 
these over-refined Egyptian forms, and ceremonies, and 
belief. So the young man felt, and he cleaved to God. 

God, in return, signally blessed him. He found himself, 
after a while, rising in the estimation of his master, who 



BEFORE THE KING. 1 93 

perceived the fidelity of the young Hebrew, his care and 
industry and quick intelligence ; and noticed also how, as 
the trusts committed to him were enlarged, a larger pros- 
perity to himself was flowing in on every side. In con- 
sequence, promotion from lower to higher grades of position 
and responsibility came, one after another, until in the course 
of time the Hebrew slave was made ^^ overseer of the house/' 
with the full and absolute control over all the captain's pos- 
sessions. " He left all that he had in Joseph's hand ; and 
he knew not aught he had, save the bread which he did 
eat." The position was one not only of great responsibility, 
but of vast labor; for the monuments, and the paintings in 
their tombs, prove that in no other country have the minutiae 
of life been more rigorously conducted or more subject to 
careful rule. Scribes are shown taking full inventories of 
possessions and losses or gains ; cattle, agricultural products, 
birds, fishes, all come under the notice of such records ; and 
the whole system of private life was regulated according to 
fixed customs or prescribed by laws. Potiphar was a person 
evidently high in authority and of large possessions. By 
degrees, as time passed on, Joseph, as the captain's admira- 
tion of him had increased, had got to be the most powerful 
man in the household. 

But other eyes — those of the captain's wife — had also 
been fixed on him in admiration, which finally grew into a 
guilty passion for the handsome young man. She made 
advances to him, which he repelled. He represented to her 
his master's trust in him and his fidelity. '^ How then can 
I do this great wickedness," he said, '' and sin against God." 
She insisted still ; and one day when he had gone into the 
house in his ordinary duties and they two were alone, she 
became so bold that he could escape only by flying from her 
presence. But she had seized on his flowing robe, and he 
had left it behind ; and now, her former passion changing 
into fury, she made use of the garment in support of false 

17 



194 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

charges against him of attempted infidelity to his master. 
A scene of fierce rage on the part of the captain and of 
indignation throughout the household followed. The re- 
vengeful woman triumphed ; the young man was hurried 
off to prison, and there he was loaded with irons and his 
feet put in the stocks.^ 

Such was the reward of his fidelity. What now could he 
hope for from the future ? The hopes which even in his 
journey across the sands to Egypt had cheered him as a 
certain reward of his purposed activity and faithfulness in 
his new, servile condition ; his long efforts in his master's 
service ; the acknowledged prosperity that had ensued to 
that master's house ; his fidelity to his master's honor ; his 
fidelity to God ; — all this, and here, now, the end ! Hope 
even was gone; what could he hope for? The passionate, 
revengeful woman, unprincipled as she had shown herself 
to be, had in her possession apparent evidence of his guilt ; 
the punishment in that country for guilt such as he was 
charged with, was severe; his master's fury, seemingly so 
just, must pursue him in every new effort; his own late 
exaltation in the palace had made him many enemies, as 
such exaltations always do, especially when the favored per- 
son is a foreigner ; and sharp tongues were everywhere now 
unloosed against him. Where was any hope left? 

Such feelings would force themselves on him in that dark 
cell through the day, and in the dreams at night, and 
through the following days, till thought became his worst 
persecutor, and an untiring one. He longed at times for 
forgetfulness of all things, except God. For God was truly 
coming to him now, as he always docs to us in our humilia- 
tions, making his presence felt by the improved heart. As 
we lose our self-confidence, he draws us in closer confidence 
to himself. He never deserts those who, even in much weak- 



' See Pb. cv. 18. 



BEFORE THE KING, 195 

ness of heart and in great darkness, are feeling around for 
him. He comes in our need. The afflictions he sends are 
remedies to the diseases of our souls, and Joseph probably 
needed such a remedy ; for the great exaltations were well 
adapted to make him proud and self-confident, and conse- 
quently forgetful of God. He was now brought low ; and 
here, in this seemingly desperate condition, this school of 
severest trial, God was preparing for him, so purified, far 
greater blessing than he had yet received. Days passed by, 
and time lengthened on; the peculiar humble quiet and 
gentleness of the young man were after a while noticed by 
the keeper of the prison, and they won their way by degrees 
even in the heart of this man, who had so often to deal with 
crime and to steel himself against all humanity. He 
watched this prisoner attentively ; and impressions of his 
innocence, and then of his entire truthfulness, at first very 
faint and probably repelled, began to take strength, and at 
last settled more and more into convictions. He trusted 
him slightly at first, and with keen observation of the 
results ; and then more and more fully ; and at last with 
entire confidence, both as respected the guardianship of 
the other prisoners and the general matters of the prison. 
Hope had become bright again in the prisoner's heart. His 
heart, purified by suffering and divested of over-confi- 
dence in himself and in earthly help, and more entirely con- 
fident in God, felt that this new hope was more vivifying 
and blessing, because it was what may be called a humble 
hope. 

These previous events of his gradual rise in Potiphar's 
house, and continued stewardship there, and the wide pros- 
perity to his master in consequence, and afterward of the 
imprisonment, and the new slowly increasing confidence in 
him at the prison, and the trust confided, all required more 
time than perhaps is perceived in the brief narrative of this 
book ; for Joseph had now been eleven years in Egypt, and 



196 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

had got to be twenty-eight years of age. At this period 
occurred an event which formed the turning-point in his life. 

The chief butler and chief baker ^ of the king had given 
him such offence, that by his order they were cast into 
prison ; and, as it turned out, they came under Joseph's 
especial charge. They had not been long in confinement, 
when, one morning, noticing a peculiar sadness in both, he 
inquired its cause; and each narrated a dream which had come 
to him during the previous night, and which seemed to have 
a peculiar, perhaps portentous, meaning. That to the chief 
baker was portentous indeed, as explained to him by Joseph 
at his request; for it signified that, in three days, he should 
be hanged by the royal order ; the chief butler^s, on the 
other hand, was interpreted to signify that at the end of the 
same period he should be restored to his former office. 
Both results occurred on the third day, as had been pre- 
dicted. Joseph had charged the butler, as a requital for 
relieving his mind by this cheerful prediction, to bring his 
case before the sovereign on his restoration, and so effect 
his own release. But the chief butler, as is often done by 
men when in prosperity, neglected the friend of his adverse 
days, and Joseph's request was unheeded, and, indeed, forgot. 

But, two years after this, Pharaoh himself had, in one 
night, two dreams apparently so similar in their meaning as 
to be significant of some very important event about to come 
to pass. In the first of these, seven " well-favored kine and 
fat-fleshed'' rose from the river and fed on its banks. Im- 
mediately afterward also came up seven others, but poor 
and lean, which presently fell on the first and devoured 
them. He awaked ; but sleeping again he saw seven ears of 
corn, "rank and good," come on a single stalk ,-^ immedi- 



* Diodorus Siculus informs us that all the officers of the ICgyptian kings 
were from the moat illustrious families of the priesthood ; no common 
person being ever permitted to serve in the presence of the monarch. 

2 Wheat now raised in Egypt has this peculiarity. 



BEFORE THE KING. 1 97 

ately after them, seven ears, '' thin and blasted with the east 
wind/^ came out also, and these devoured the former. 

Now the king, as the reader will remember, was con- 
sidered as a representative of the Deity ; was named after 
Phrah, the god of the sun or light, and was supposed to re- 
ceive especial enlightenment; and, as Diodorus informs us, 
dreams were regarded in that country with religious rever- 
ence. In this case there were two dreams having such 
resemblance as seemed to give them particular significance, 
while the connection of one of them with the river, if they 
meant anything at all, evidently associated that stream with 
its meaning. Every one knows that the very existence 
of tne Egyptians depends upon the Nile; and that, if their 
river fails to attain the needed height in its annual flood, a 
famine ensues ; and therefore how keenly and anxiously the 
rising of the water inch by inch must be watched and 
heralded over the country. Pharaoh's dreams were conse- 
quently adapted to create a strong curiosity if not nervous 
anxiety ; and in the morning he had his ^^ wise men'' and 
magicians summoned before him ; and having informed them 
of the occurrences in the night, demanded an explanation. 
They dared not venture upon any. It would have been 
easy to give a fanciful exposition; but the monarch was evi- 
dently in a nervous earnestness, and their vague guesses 
might very readily cost them their lives. They hesitated, 
could not agree, doubted, and drew back in fear. Their 
eyes fell before the scowling, angry glances of the absolute 
king. The whole subject was now every moment taking 
additional importance in the agitated household in conse- 
quence of the general dilemma ; for, on the refusal of the 
wise men and magicians, the pertinacity and earnestness of 
the monarch increased ; and with these the dream was in- 
creasing in its importance in his eyes. 

His chief butler came forward now, greatly to the 
relief of all. The occurrences in his prison life had just 

17* 



198 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

flashed on his mind, with a pang too, perhaps, at his forget- 
fulness of his promise to Joseph. He presented himself 
before Pharaoh, and narrated the incidents connected with 
his own dream and the baker's ; — the " young man, a He- 
brew, servant to the captain of the guard,'' might perhaps 
solve the mystery of these dreams. 

Joseph was hastily sent for, but the summons found him 
not in a condition to appear before the king. Although 
trusted by the jailer, he was still a prisoner, and the false 
charges made by Potiphar and his wife were still resting 
upon his name. He had consequently in this long time of 
his grief and disgrace allowed his hair to grow ; and the 
court etiquette would not permit even the monarch's curi- 
osity to be gratified until the young man was put in proper 
condition to appear before him. Joseph was shaved' and 
becomingly clothed, and was then led through the halls of 
the grand palace and into the presence of Pharaoh. 

It was a very striking scene ; the architectural magnifi- 
cence all around, where centuries of human skill and labor 
had combined to deify the monarch himself in men's eyes ; 
the king, feeling himself still mortal in his perplexity and 
troubled by a dream, now eyeing the young Hebrew with 
keen and scrutinizing looks ; the magicians and wise men 
standing by, relieved from the fury of the monarch's wrath, 
and so far thankful to Joseph, yet, with all this, keenly 
jealous of him, and hoping that he would somehow make 
a faihire; the courtiers, admiring the young man's good 
looks and his composed though not presumptuous bearing 
in the presence of the king, and with their admiration and 
hopes mingling also many fears for him in the coming trial 
of his skill; the butler, now almost as nervous as the 
monarch ; Joseph, the centre of all eyes, feeling that God 
had surely and clearly come to his aid, and would be his 



» Gen. xli. 14. 



BEFORE THE KING. 



199 




TUTHMOSIS III. (Tetmes-Ra-men-Kheper). Thought to be the Pharaoh of Joseph's 

time. 
(C4?pied ly cartful tracing from Lepsiv^ look.) 



200 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT, 

helper here. The crisis of his life he knew had come ; God 
would be with him in it. So he was calm. 

Pharaoh said, curtly, in words that did not show much 
confidence in the young man — 

" I have dreamed a dream, and there is none that can in- 
terpret it ; and I have heard say of thee that thou canst 
understand a dream to interpret it.^^ The answer was — 

" It is not in me; God shall give Pharaoh an answer of 
peace.^^ 

The monarch narrated both dreams as they had occurred. 
Joseph replied — 

" The dream of Pharaoh is one ; God hath shewed Pha- 
raoh what he is about to do. The seven good kine are 
seven years ; and the seven good ears are seven years : the 
dream is one. And the seven thin and ill-favored kine that 
came up after them are seven years ; and the seven empty 
ears blasted with the east wind shall be seven years of famine. 

" This is the thing which I have spoken unto Pharaoh : 
what God is about to do he sheweth unto Pharaoh. Behold, 
there come seven years of great plenty throughout all the 
land of Egypt. And there shall arise after them seven 
years of famine ; and all the plenty shall be forgotten 
in the land of Egypt ; and the famine shall consume the 
land. And the plenty shall not be known in the land by 
reason of that famine following; for it shall be very 
grievous. And for that the dream was doubled unto Pha- 
raoh twice; it is because the thing is established by God, 
and God will shortly bring it to pass. 

" Now therefore let Pharaoh look out a man discreet and 
wise, and set him over the land of Egypt. Let Pharaoh 
do this, and let him appoint officers over the land, and take 
up the fifth part of the land of Egypt in the seven plente- 
ous years. And let them gather all the food of those good 
years that come, and lay up corn under the hand of Pha- 
raoh, and let them keep food in the cities. And that food 



BEFORE THE KING, 20I 

shall be for store to the land against the seven years of 
famine, which shall be in the land of Egypt ; that the land 
perish not through the famine.'^ 

We shall give in the next chapter an account by an eye- 
witness of a famine in Egypt ; but we cannot by reading 
even it have an idea of the horror which crept through the 
hearts of all those listeners to Joseph's interpretation, when 
he came to the prediction of a general famine in that land. 
If his hearers had not witnessed, they had at least all heard, 
of extreme cases of this kind occurring now and then by the 
entire failure in the river floods, if only for a season or two; 
but here, when the idea broke gradually upon them from 
his words that the famine would be /or seven years and abso- 
lute, consuming the land, they stood horror-stricken, as if 
they could already see all those frightful things with which 
description had made their ears to tingle, now already 
come upon them. It was too terrible for belief, — they 
thought; — and yet even among those who doubted most, 
and tried hardest to reject belief, there was still a fear creep- 
ing through all their being, horrifying and paralyzing them 
in spite of their determined rejections. 

As to Pharaoh, he led the way to a consultation with his 
lords and counsellors. All had been struck with the modest 
and respectful yet composed bearing of the young man. 
He had spoken not presumingly yet confidently ; he spoke 
as if he was really guided by the unerring Power that he 
said was giving him the utterances ; and they had seen in 
his eyes and heard in the tones of his voice a confidence 
thrilling them by its terrifying nature, but showing no pre- 
sumption in him. They felt overwhelmed and crushed by 
what seemed to be coming. '^ Seven years! the land con- 
sumed r' No wonder that the council held by the king was 
an agitated and gloomy one ! 

And yet, after all, it might not be. Thus many of them 
tried to satisfy themselves. The king, however, was con- 



202 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT, 

vinced. His dream had been so vivid and all so life-like, 
while strange, that he yielded to a belief in the interpreta- 
tion ; all acceded to the soundness of Joseph^s advice ; the 
doubters thought that, as the seven years of plenty were to 
be first, there would be a long time — a safe period in which 
to make up their minds for what was to come afterward ; but 
the king felt himself called upon, as the father of his people, 
to act at once. 

It would not require much questioning of the captain of 
the guard and the keeper of the prison to satisfy him that 
Joseph's administrative qualities were of the highest order ; 
and also that everything under his hand had prospered 
while he was with them. The monarch " said unto his ser- 
vants. Can we find such a one as this, a man in whom the 
spirit of God is?'^ and the words of this question will bring 
to the reader's memory what has just been remarked in this 
book, namely, that the Egyptians deified the attributes of 
God, and had a deity which they called '' The Spirit of 
God.^' This god was called Kneph or Neph, and was 
represented by the Urseus (asp), which hence became an 
emblem of royalty, and may be seen sculptured over the 
forehccvvl of Tuthmosis III., and still more strikingly in the 
case of the other Pharaohs given in this book. 

Could he find any one — the king thought — so fit to pre- 
pare the land for the terrible calamities before it? The 
office would indeed require the highest rank and authority, 
but any gift which the royal power could bestow would be 
wisely and well bestowed if it could save the country from 
the horrors seemingly so surely to come. 

Therefore, before the seven years of plenty had begun, 
which was not long subsequently to this, Jose})h had been 
made chief ruler under the king, who had taken off the 
signet ring of highest power and had given it to him ; 
** had arrayed him in vestures of fine linen and put a gold 
chain about his neck ; and made him to ride in the second 



BEFORE THE KING. 203 

cliariot which he had/^ ^ while runners before cried to all in 
the way to '^ bow the knee/^ The monarch said to him, 
^^ I am Pharaoh, and without thee shall no man lift up his 
hand or foot in all the land of Egypt ;" '' only in the throne 
will I be greater than thou/^ This was indeed a case of 
most extraordinary power given to a subject ; but the duty 
before Joseph, that of taking by compulsion, if this should 
be necessary, sufficient of the seven years^ surplus piuducts 
to serve all the country during the long scarcity, and to store 
it away, would require immense power to be vested in the 
chief executive officer of the kingdom. Pharaoh also 
changed the name of Joseph to Zo.ph-naih-'paaneahy said by 
some critics to mean the Revealer of Secrets,'^ Still more to 
bind him to the interests of the country, and doubtless also 
to honor him further, the monarch gave him for wife 
Asenath,^ the daughter of Poti-pherah, priest of On. 

On, called also by them Ha-ra^ " the abode of Ra,^' or 
the sun, and by the Greeks HeliopoIiSy " city of the sun/^ has 
already been noticed in this book as pre-eminently the sacred 
city of Egypt, and was about fifteen miles northeast from 
Memphis, near the eastern bank of the Nile. It was, in 
more respects than one, a gem among their cities ; for it was 
not only highly embellished as their most holy spot, but it 



1 " A vesture of fine linen was especially the dress of the Egyptian priests 
as well as of the king himself, whose transparent upper garments of fine 
linen are known by the monuments. (Compare Herodotus ii. 37.) The 
elevation of Joseph into the most distinguished class of the priests or 
princes is shown by this laying on of fine linen garments." " Precious 
necklaces and chains were bestowed by the Egyptian kings as particular 
marks of distinction. Several very illustrative representations of this, 
from Thebes and Tel-el-amarna, will be disclosed in the work of the Prus- 
sian Expedition." " At festive processions, the chariot of the queen used 
to follow that of the king, and after it the chariot of the princes. Joseph 
was thus treated like a son of a king." — Ancient Egypt under the Pharaohs^ 
by John Kenrick, M. A. 

2 The Septuagint says it was Psouthom Phanech, meaning saviour of the age. 
^ The name is said to mean servant of Neith, the Egyptian Minerva. 



204 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT, 

became also what may be called the Oxford of Egypt, a 
place famous for learned men ; and was resorted to by distin- 
guished persons from other countries in order to be in- 
structed in the Egyptian learning. Herodotus resorted to 
it for information ; Strabo came at a later period, and to the 
latter was pointed out there the house in which Plato, three 
centuries and a half previously (about 390 B. C), had spent 
three years under the instruction of the Egyptian priests ; 
indeed, these Grecian philosophers imbibed, at On, most of 
the learning which they afterward disseminated over the 
world. 

The city was built on an artificial platform made to secure 
it fully from high inundations ; it was not of very large 
dimensions, but was richly ornamented with temples and 
their appurtenances and with dwellings for the priests. 
Before the great temple stood the obelisk which is still a 
solitary relic of the past grandeur, presiding over the im- 
mense level wastes ; formerly, doubtless there was another 
of the size of this, which is sixty-eight feet above its base, 
for such embellishments went in pairs; and from them, 
leading to the great gateway of the city, was an avenue of 
sphinxes, of which travellers think they can still trace 
remains. Our word obelisk is said to be from Uben-ra or 
Uben-lay Stinbeam, or Finger of the Siin,^ Close by the 
temple was a large fountain of pure, cool water, an object 
scarcely to be seen in any other part of Egypt, and still 
existing, though now choked by weeds ; this also was sacred 
to this god. In the temple was a huge mirror of burnished 
gold, so contrived as all day to reflect the beams of the sun, 



1 It is curious to 8ee how the ancient heathen usages and naraea liave in- 
corporated tliemselves into languagcfi and usages all over the world. The 
ohelisk, the favorite shape for monuments in Christian cemeteries, is a 
relic of tlie sim-worship. It is scarcely necefisary to add that the names 
of all our days in the week, and of most of the months, are from those of 
heathen deities. 



BEFORE THE KING, 205 

and diffuse them through the building. Over the portal of 
the building we may imagine the statue of their sun-god, 
here represented by a hawk-headed monster; for the sharp- 
eyed hawk was considered a good emblem of their deity. 
" Enter ; and the dark temple opens and contracts success- 
ively into its outermost, its inner and innermost hall ; the 
Osirides [sculptured figures] in their placid majesty support 
the first; the wild and savage exploits of kings and heroes 
fill the second ; and in the furthest recess of all, underneath 
the carved figure of the sun-god and beside the solid altar, 
sat in his gilded cage the sacred hawk, or lay couched on 
his purple bed the sacred black calf, Mnevis or Urmer, each 
a living, almost incarnate, representative of the deity of the 
temple. Thrice a day, before the deified beast, the incense 
was offered, and once a month the solemn sacrifice. Each, 
on his death, was duly embalmed and deposited in a splendid 
sarcophagus. One such mummy calf is still to be seen at 
Cairo. The sepulchres of the long succession of deified 
calves at Heliopolis corresponded to those of the deified 
bulls at Memphis.''^ 

We are able thus to judge of the situation of Joseph in 
Egypt, and of the influences at home and abroad throughout 
the nation, over which, as executive, he was now fully in- 
stalled. Idolatry, with its whisperings of reason for its 
origin ; with its appeals from outward objects — the sun-god 
warming and vivifying all nature ; with its gorgeous tem- 
ples of most imposing architecture and splendid worship ; 
with its priests embodying the learning of the country, and 
jealous of all other learning and other worship; — such were 
the outside influences upon Joseph. At home was the wife, 
brought up at On, and bound by all early associations, by 
her education, and by all the ties of filial affection, to the 
religion of her father, whose name itself, Poti-pherah, Be- 

1 Stanley. 
18 



2o6 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

longing to Rah, or the sun, seemed to make fidelity to him 
and her religion synonymous. Then also his patron Pha- 
raoh, and the courtiers, and all his associates throughout the 
kingdom exercising public or silent influences ; — everything 
indeed, at home or abroad, was of a nature to draw off* the 
young man from his allegiance to God. 

Yet he seems to have been unswervingly faithful to Jeho- 
vah. He was also so far from disclaiming his origin that he 
gave Hebrew names to the two sons born to him during his 
honors, calling the first Manasseh, ^'Forgeifulness,^^ and the 
second Ephraim, '^Fridtfulness/' " For God,^^ he said, " hath 
caused me to be fruitful in the land of my affliction.^^ 



CHAPTER XXI. 
THE NILE— LIFE f OR DEATH? 

PLENTY ; ilien famine ; seven years of each ; such had 
been the announcement to the Egyptians ! The news 
of this interpretation of the dreams was carried quickly all 
over the country, and was variously received. The reve- 
rence for the monarch was universal ; and every one believed 
also that the dreams had some special meaning : but the 
interpretation had been hidden from their wise men ; and 
notwithstanding the king's decision, there were doubters 
everywhere respecting the judgment of this young man, a 
stranger, one of a different religion, and, moreover, just 
taken from a j)rison where he had been placed on a heinous 
charge. The community wished to doubt; for although no 
one could object to the prospect of seven years of plenty, that 
of such a subsequent famiue was so appalling to every one's 
mind as to create almost a determination not to believe in 



THE NILE— LIFE f OR DEATH? 207 

the possibility of such a thing. Indeed, although there 
were traditions of very frightful famines, one of such con- 
tinuance had probably never yet been known, and seemed to 
be scarcely within the range of possibilities ; people tried to 
believe it utterly impossible. 

Yet such determination, and also forced conviction when 
this could be attained, left in the minds of even the most 
resolved, a restless, anxious feeling, a nervousness and a 
watching that showed to themselves that their protestations 
against belief were not solidly built. All knew, however, 
that one part of the prediction must soon be put to the test 
by the nature of the next rising of the Nile; and for this 
all waited now with the deepest interest. When the swell- 
ing of the stream did commence, the rise was watched by 
every one as it had never been watched before. Terrible in 
the minds of all was the thought of the famine — a famine 
for seven years : the possible plenty was little regarded in 
the comparison with such subsequent possible horrors ; in 
every one's anticipations those latter seven years were already, 
as in the dream, blasting all sense of comfort in any antici- 
pations respecting the preceding ones. 

In order that the reader may better see what a horror 
there could be in such expectations, he will here be pre- 
sented with an account of a famine in A. D. 1199, by an eye- 
witness, Abdallatif, a learned physician of Bagdad, at that 
time a resident in Egypt. 

It may be -proper to say now that the valley of the Nile 
is six hundred miles long by an average of nine miles in 
width, except at the lower end, where the mountains which 
bound it retire on either side, and the stream, then branching 
into three channels, sweeps along in what is called the 
Delta, a vast extent of perfectly level country more per- 
meated by moisture than that above. 

It is singular that the two great mysteries of Egypt, — the 
language of the hieroglyphics and the sources of the Nile, 



2o8 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

should have yielded their secrets to persevering research at 
periods so near to each other, one in 1822, the other within 
a few years ; for the origin of the river, which Nero tried in 
vain to discover by means of his centurions, and which 
continued to defy scrutiny from that down even through 
Mehemet Ali's all-powerful rule, has been discovered by 
English explorers; first by Speke and Grant in 1862, and 
then more fully by S. W. Baker, accompanied by his wife, 
in 1864. The former discovered the great lake Victoria 
Nyanza, and Baker the adjoining, still larger lake, Albert 
Nyanza, both lying at the equator, and by the mountains 
adjoining them and confluents, giving rise to this so long 
mysterious stream. The river is fed by them in a full and 
pretty regular flow, till it is joined by the Blue Nile in 
about 15° and the Abara about lat. 17° N. These two 
latter streams are the causes of the periodical overflow. 
They rise in the mountains of Abyssinia, which in summer 
are deluged with rains; and from being, — the former an in- 
navigable stream, and the latter scarcely more than a dry 
channel, — they become immediately rivers of great dimen- 
sions, pouring down the accumulations of w^ater and earth 
from the interior of that country. Mr. Baker says, ^^At 
that season the White Nile [from the lakes] is at a consid- 
erable level, although not at its highest; and the sudden 
rush of water descending from Abyssinia into the main 
channel, already at a fair level from the White Nile, causes 
the annual inundation in Lower Egypt.^' 

The rise in this lower part of the stream commences 
about the middle of June, and continues increasing through 
July. In August begins the general overflowing of Egypt, 
which is regulated by means of sluices made in the banks 
(for the banks are higher than the rest of the valley) ; and 
soon the country resembles a vast lake, with only at inter- 
vals specks like islands, at spots where the villages are built. 
The flood finally remains stationary for twelve days, and 



THE NILE— LIFE f OR DEATH f 209 

then begins to subside ; and toward the end of October the 
river has returned within its banks. As soon as the waters 
have subsided sufficiently, the grain is scattered over the wet 
ground, and without further labor, if the flood has been suf- 
ficient, it soon changes the whole aspect of the country into 
smiling verdure, a forerunner of most ample agricultural 
wealth. If the rise of water is up to sixteen cubits, the 
inhabitants know that a sufficiency for comfort has been 
secured ; a rise to eighteen cubits gives them supply enough 
for two years, even after the government duties have been 
paid ; if it reaches nineteen cubits, the subsidence will be 
too late for the proper sowing-time and a scarcity ensues. 
All below sixteen cubits is followed more or less by scarcity; 
and the suffering is greater in the same proportion as the 
scantiness of the flood is short of this. 

The reader is probably aware that rains are almost un- 
known in Egypt, and that if they do come, it is in quanti- 
ties scarcely sufficient to wet the ground for a few minutes. 
The life of all the inhabitants is involved in the simple fact 
of the sufficient rise of this river. 

We can very well imagine then, the deep interest with 
which the Nilomeier^ a column near the ancient Memphis, 
graduated for showing the rise or fall of water, is watched ; 
and the eagerness with which the official reports made from 
it, are received throughout the country ; the nervousness at 
certain critical parts of the flood ; and the universal joy or 
universal despair, according as the river decides. 

In the first stages of its rise, a green scum with aquatic 
mosses and vegetable fibres is seen on the surface ; and it 
is a bad sign if these are not borne quickly away by the 
force of the current washing out the nooks of the shores ; 
still worse, if the water begins to assume a green tinge, and 
has a bad odor, showing decomposition in its sluggish 
depths. In the year 1199 it became insufferable to taste 
and smell, and all who could do so had recourse to water 

18 ^^ 



2IO jLJFK-SCENBS from THE OLD TESTAMENT, 

from wells. Abdallatif boiled some from the Nile; "but 
that only made it worse, and when he let a portion of 
it stand in a narrow-necked bottle, and had taken oiF the 
scum, he found the water, though clear, as fetid as ever. 
This lasted in that terrible year all through June, July and 
part of August ; and beside the putrid vegetable matter, 
there were worms and other creatures that swarmed in the 
stagnant waters.^^' 

For four centuries previous to A. D. 966, the river had 
only six times failed to reach fourteen cubits ; and about 
twenty times only it stopped at fifteen cubits. In 966 it 
rose only to twelve cubits and seventeen digits; in 1199 
only four cubits higher. In June of this last year people 
were already greatly alarmed by the indications on the slug- 
gish stream. Through July the unfavorable signs increased; 
in August, alarm was giving way to despair; on the 9th of 
September it was announced that the water was subsiding. 
All hope was gone ! 

The other scenes of this year we give in the words of 
Abdallatif: "Under these circumstances, the year presented 
itself as a monster whose wrath must annihilate all the 
resources of life and all the means of subsistence. There 
was no longer any hope of a further rise of tlie Nile; and 
already therefore the price of provisions had risen ; the 
provinces were desolated by drought ; the inhabitants fore- 
saw an inevitable scarcity, and the fear of famine excited 
tunuiltuous commotions among men. The inhabitants of 
the villages and country estates repaired to the great pro- 
vincial towns ; large numbers emigrated to Syria, Magreb, 
Hedjaz and Yemen, where they dispersed themselves on 
every hand, as did formerly the descendants of Saba. 
There was also an infinite number wlio sought retreat in 
the towns of Misr [Old Cairo] and Cairo, where they 



^ " Eastern Life." 



THE NILE— LIFE? OR DEATH f 2il 

experienced a frightful famine and mortality ; for when 
the sun had entered Aries^ the air had become corrupt, 
pestilence and a mortal contagion began to be felt ; and the 
poor, pressed by a continually increasing famine, ate car- 
rion, corpses, dogs, and the dung of animals. They went 
further, even devouring little children. It was not an un- 
common thing to surprise people with infants roasted or 
boiled. ... I myself saw in a basket an infant that had 
been roasted. It was brought to the magistrate, and with it 
a man and woman who were said to be its parents, and 
whom the magistrate sentenced to be burned alive 

^^ When the poor began to eat human flesh, the horror 
and astonishment caused by the practice were such that 
these crimes were the material of every one^s conversation, 
and the subject seemed inexhaustible; but afterward peo- 
ple became so accustomed to it, and such a relish began to 
spread for this detestable food, that some came to make it 
their ordinary meat, to eat it as a treat, and even to lay in a 
stock of it ; different ways of preparing this flesh were made 
known ; and the use of it being once introduced, the custom 
extended to the provinces, so that there was no part of 
Egypt where it might not be met with. Then it no longer 
caused any surprise ; the horror which it had first inspired 
ceased to be felt ; and people spoke and heard of it as an 
indifferent and ordinary thing 

" There were children of the poor, some in infancy and 
some growing up, who had no one to look after them, spread 
through all the quarters of the city, and in the narrowest 
streets like locusts that are beaten down in the fields. Poor 
people, men and women, lay in wait for these wretched 
children, carried them off and ate them. It was rarely that 
they could be detected in the very act, and when they were 
not on their guard. ... In the space of a few days as 
many as thirty women were burnt [for this], every one of 
whom confessed that she had eaten several children 



212 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT, 

"This frightful calamity^ which I have just represented, 
extended over all Egypt ; there was not a single inhabited 
spot where the practice of eating human flesh did not be- 
come extremely common 

"As for the number of the poor who perished from hun- 
ger and exhaustion, God only knows what it was. What 
we shall say of it must be regarded only as a slight sketch 
which may convey some idea of the fearful excess reached 
by this mortality. One thing of which I may speak, as 
having seen it myself, at Misr, at Cairo, and in the neigh- 
boring places, is, that wherever we went, there was not a 
spot in which one's feet or one's eyes were not encountered 
by a corpse or a man in the agonies of death, or even a 
great number in this dreadful state. Day by day, from one 
hundred to five hundred dead bodies were taken from Cairo 
to be carried to the place where they might have funeral rites. 
At Misr the number of the dead was incalculable. They 
were not buried, but merely cast out of the town. At last 
there were not enough living left to carry away the dead, 
and they remained in the open air among the houses and 
shops, or even in the interiors of dwellings 

"As for the suburbs and villages, all the inhabitants 
perished except a small number, of whom a portion quitted 
their abodes to go somewhere else. We must scarcely 
except from what I have now said the capitals of the pro- 
vinces and the largest villages A traveller often passed 

through a large village without seeing a single living in- 
habitant. He saw the houses standing open, and the corpses 
of those who had lived there stretched out o]>posite one 
another — some decayed and some recently dead. Very 
often there was a house full of furniture, without any one 
to take possession of it. What I am now saying has been 
communicated to me by several i)ersons whose narratives 
confirmed each other. One of them said as follows : — ^ We 
arrived at a village and there found no living thing on the 



AB UNDANCE— FAMINE, 2 1 3 

earth or in the air From thence we went to another 

village, where we were told that there had been till now 
four hundred weaving-shops ; and it presented to us the 
same scene of desolation as the first. We saw the weaver 
dead in his loom-pit and all his dead family around him. . . 
We then proceeded to another village, where we found 
things just in the same state ; no creature living, and the 
inhabitants all become the prey of death.^ .... 

^^According to the testimony of a great number of wit- 
nesses, the road between Egypt and Syria was like a vast 
field sown with human bodies ; or rather like a plain which 
had just been swept by the scythe of the mower. It had 
become as a banquet-hall for the birds and wild beasts which 
gorged themselves on their flesh ; and the very dogs that 
those fugitives had taken with them to share their exile 
were the first to devour their bodies.^^ 



CHAPTER XXII. 
AB UNDANCE— FAMINE. 



ALL over Egypt, then, as the time for the annual rise 
drew nigh, there was a nervous excitement, an anxiety, 
a wide hope, a universal dread. Dread was strongest, and 
the horror about such a famine as had been predicted often 
swallowed up every other thought. 

We can well suppose also that, amid all this, there were 
great jealousies at work respecting Joseph himself and his 
vast honors, especially in the court ; enmities among the wise 
men and magicians ; scorn among the priests at his religion ; 
while everywhere busy tongues, of their own accord or put 
in motion by others, were trying to do him harm, and to 



214 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

counteract his influence in the government. But Pharaoh 
Avas with him ; and, what was far better, God was on his 
side. 

June, so eagerly looked for, came at last ; and with it, the 
flood, now the subject of so many inquisitive thoughts. The 
river soon swept along, bearing on its swift waters all green 
slime and scum ; the signs for a fruitful season quickly be- 
came of the most decisive kind. Fourteen cubits were before 
long officially reported at the Nilometer, and from mouth to 
mouth all over the country ; then fifteen ; then sixteen. The 
sluices were now all open, the land was fast becoming en- 
tirely submerged ; — all except the usual island-like spots of 
safety for their villages and herds, and also at the banks. 

Seventeen cubits now ! There could have been a fear in 
some hearts that their gods would take offence at the eleva- 
tion of this foreigner of another religion, and have taken 
vengeance by a failure of the river ; but no ! they were not 
angry, but were giving full tokens for a most abundant 
season. 

" Eighteen cubits !'^ Joy and sorrow came with the an- 
nunciation ; a bright certainty ; and with it a deepening 
dread ; for here in these indications of a most abundant 
season, — just what the interpretation of the dreams had pre- 
dicted, — was an intimation that the horrible prediction of 
the seven years' famine would also prove true. They dared 
not let themselves think of this latter. They M^ould have 
preferred to have the flood stand still at the lower figures, 
even although it was now to give them a more than a two 
years' abundant supply. 

But would it remain at this? or go higher yet? The 
gods, offended, might show their anger by drowning their 
land in an excess of the favorite boon, and indeed this 
would be no unworthy manner of showing their resent- 
ment ! 

But no ! The waters had begun to subside. After 



ABUNDANCE— FAMINE, 215 

reaching the eighteenth cubit mark, or about that, they had 
become stationary ; and now the Nilometer was showing a 
retrograde movement of their level. 

A vast abundance was before the inhabitants, yet they 
were disappointed and grieved. The broad prediction for 
the next fourteen years was of such a nature that anything 
tending to confirm it filled them with dread. So, every- 
where over the country, as the quiet waters were now drop- 
ping their rich pabulum on the ground, people's feelings 
were agitated, and the prospect of a coming rich harvest 
was a subject not so much of joy as of gloom. 

But still, this one year was not decisive (so they argued). 
Perhaps the next one would put a contradiction on that 
fearful prophecy. They would w^ait and hope. 

The king and Joseph, however, did not indulge in any 
quiet waiting. The former, if we are right in our suppo- 
sition as to the individual, was a man of remarkable force 
of character, of extensive views in government, and great 
determination of will ; and having decided on his course 
respecting the closely-coming events, he gave to his Prime 
Minister, who might indeed almost be called Viceroy, the 
fullest power for such precautionary measures as the latter 
might deem best. Joseph was now thirty years of age. The 
golden royal gift about his neck, the costume as a prince of 
the household, and the chariot with significant devices, next 
only to those of the king, gave him authority wherever he 
might go ; and before the beginning of the yearly flood he 
had gone ^^ throughout all the land of Egypt,'' forming 
plans and giving orders for measures to save the surplus of 
the coming abundant crop. Therefore, when after the flood 
above noticed the teeming earth became an unbroken scene 
of exuberance sufficient to fill with gladness the hearts of a 
people not oppressed, as they were, with that dread of com- 
ing woes, his agents had storehouses ready ; in due time, 
doubtless, either by purchase or because the sovereign had 



2i6 LIFE SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

the right of possession, the fifth part of the grain was gath- 
ered into them and safely stored away. To every individnal 
in the kingdom it was evident that Pharoali and Josej)h 
were earnest believers in the dreams and the interpretations. 
People looked on approvingly and disapprovingly ; every 
store-house seemed to them to be as a prophecy of horrors, and 
a confirmation of fears wliich they were unwilling to have 
enter their hearts and were fighting against. Seven years 
of famine ! The whole land to be consumed ! The thing 
was not to be thouglit of, if the thought could be kept 
away ; and yet here, constantly staring at them, were the 
seeming proofs that such a time must come. At all events, 
come what might, they saw that the precaution was a wise 
one. But the prospect was terrible ! 

Thus time wore on ; and then June came round once 
more. Again the people were watching, scanning the river- 
banks, scanning its surface, noting every inch of rise. 
Again they saw the mosses and green scum swept rapidly 
away by the rushing waters; again they saw the gradual but 
sure increase of the flood. Sixteen cubits! Seventeen! 
now up to eighteen I there stationary ! and then again the 
subsiding commenced, just as in the previous year! 

People now resigned themselves to what seemed clearly to 
be the inevitable. More readily than in the past harvest 
season, they assisted in this one, and gave up the surplus of 
their crops, and helped to fill the store-houses ; looking on 
all now with a kind of dogged despair. Tongues which 
had publicly or secretly charged on Joseph that he was trying 
to frighten both king and nation, grew silent ; and hands 
which were reluctant before or (piite held back, were readily 
stretched out to assist; and every one saw with satisfaction 
the increase of stores in which their only hope was now be- 
ginning to rest. It was true that there had been only two 
years of this superabundance; and the predictions might, 
aft(M' all, (urn out to be false; but then two such extraordi- 



ABUNDANCE— FAMINE. 21/ 

nary years, taken together with the dreams of their sove- 
reign, were satisfactory to most persons ; and therefore, to 
the great ferment of thought and feeling throughout the 
nation there now succeeded the quietude of a confirmed 
belief, gloomy as it was. They concluded to take with 
satisfaction the abundance while it was still theirs. 

A third year passed like the former two ; and then a 
fourth ; and then three others, making the seven. The next 
one was to initiate the famine ! 

But in the mean time all the store-houses had been filled. 
" Joseph gathered,'^ says the Sacred Record, " corn as the 
sand of the sea, very much until he left numbering ; for it 
was without number.^' In every city there were deposits 
of grain so immense that the people had a feeling of safety 
even for the coming dreaded crisis. Since they had become 
satisfied that it would come, they had been constantly turn- 
ing their eyes toward these granaries, as places where was 
their only hope, and toward Joseph as their great benefac- 
tor; and now, when all was over, and the time for the dearth 
had come, they folded their hands and waited in subdued 
feelings and patient resignation, with a knowledge that no 
resistance or no eflFort on their part could avail anything. 

In the next year the river, as all now expected, failed to 
rise. We know what were the first precursors of such a 
failure; the slow gathering of its slimy matter into side 
eddies, where this decomposing substance moved sluggishly, 
and then rested and turned into poison ; and then the offen- 
sive character of the taste and smell of the water itself, till 
people turned from their once precious beverage in disgust. 
Then came the rise by such slow degrees that the inhabit- 
ants thought it useless to watch or make report ; then the 
resting of the flood at a low degree; and then the decline. 
All had expected it ; no one felt surprised ; no one felt hor- 
rified ; that latter feeling had came to them long before, 
and had been indulged till it had died away in one of des- 

19 



2i8 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

pair. Despair was now the most familiar of all feelings 
in the land. 

Then the whole valley soon turned to powder ; plants, 
herbage, trees, all vegetation perished. The entire popula- 
tion would also have perished if it had not been for the 
provident care of the king and Joseph ; and all now yielded 
their grateful acknowledgments, increasing in warmth every 
year, as the frightfulness of the dearth was also becoming 
greater year by year. 

The store houses were opened, and grain, as it Avas needed 
for man and beast, was served out. The Prime Minister 
showed his right knowledge of human nature in not making 
the distribution gratuitous ; for that would have made the 
inhabitants lose their self-respect, and would have humiliated 
them into feeling themselves to be paupers, each in his own 
eyes and in the regard of others ; but he sold the grain, 
doubtless requiring little for it, but making them feel that 
it was theirs by purchase, and not given to them degraded 
as beggars living on the public bounty. They were able 
thus to preserve one of the best feelings in our nature — 
their self-respect, — a feeling with which even a slave may 
be a noble man. 



CHAPTER XXIII. 
MEETING WITH THE BROTHERS. 

TWO years of the famine had j)assed away. The inter- 
pretation of the dreams had declared that it should " con- 
sume the land ;'' which was indeed the case ; and the long 
dr()Ut::lit which was drying uj) the sources of their river had 
also reached other countries, producing in them a similar 



MEETING WITH THE BROTHERS, 219 

result. The inhabitants of neighboring lands, informed of 
the foresight that had been exercised in Egypt, resorted to 
that country now for supplies. 

One day, as Joseph was engaged in the multifarious du- 
ties of his office, ten men, foreign in person and costume, 
presented themselves as applicants for grain, and bowed 
down before him with their faces to the earth. 

They were his brothers ! 

He knew them at once, but they failed to recognize him ; 
indeed, had not the slightest suspicion that Zaphnath- 
paaneah, the mighty Governor of Egypt, before them, was 
the brother whom, twenty-two years previously, they had 
sold to the Ishmaelites. He was now thirty-nine years of 
age, and the time intervening had made great changes in 
the person of him who had been the stripling of the parti- 
colored garment. His head was now clean shaved; and the 
bald crown or the close-fitting cap or the elaborate heavy 
wig would, any of them, be alone sufficient to change his 
appearance beyond the power of recognition among men 
who had never once dreamed of meeting him in circum- 
stances like these. 

A thrill ran through him as he saw them stooping and 
making their obeisance. His dream came back to his 
memory, and the scene at home when he was narrating it 
all flashed up before him. Then, as they rose and stood 
before him, came also that scene at Doth an ; the savage ex- 
pression of their faces there, his entreaties and his agonized 
expectation of death at their hands ; — all this was flashed 
upon his memory now. There they were, — his savage, 
cruel brothers ! His eye was lighted up with many strange 
sensations in the quick glance he gave them ; then he no- 
ticed that Benjamin was missing. Had they also made way 
with him ? — He would know. 

^' Ye are spies,^^ he said ; '' to see the nakedness of the 
land ye are come.^^ They answered meekly. 



220 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

'^ Nay, my lord, but to buy food are thy servants oome. 
We are all one man's sons ; we are true men ; thy servants 
are no spies/' 

He wished to drive 'them into disclosures about home, 
while they were here in his power ; and he knew, at the 
same time, how treacherous their answers might be. He 
repeated, 

" Nay, but to see the nakedness of the land ye are come." 
They replied, 

" Thy servants are twelve brethren, the sons of one man 
in the land of Canaan ; and, behold, the youngest is this 
day with our father, and one is not/' 

" That is it that I spake unto you, saying, Ye are spies. 
Hereby ye shall be proved; by the life of Pharaoh ye shall 
not go hence except your youngest brother come hither. 
Send one of you, and let him fetch your brother, and ye 
shall be kept in prison that your words may be proved, 
whether there be any truth in you ; or else, by the life of 
Pharaoh, surely ye are spies." 

They were put into confinement, and kept there for three 
days; and a time it was to them of very bitter reflection, 
and of many harrowing reminiscences of the past. This 
land into which they had sold their brother into slavery had 
become their place of punishment; they felt the retribution 
to be just. For twenty-two years they had kept up a lie 
before their father ; his long and deep sorrowing for their 
brother, in whicli he had refused to be comforted, not 
having moved them to a disclosure. Heaven, they must 
believe, had marked it all. Joseph's fate they could not 
tell ; they only knew that in the land into which he was sold, 
slavery was a hard and unj)itied existence. Perhaps he had 
perished under it by slow degrees. It was their act. And 
here, now, in this land, they felt that God was bringing on 
them punishment for their dark crime toward him, and for 
the long-sustained deception toward their father in his over- 



MEETING WITH THE BROTHERS. 221 

whelming grief. On the third day they were sent for by 
the Governor, who then addressed them : 

'' This do and live ; for I fear God. If ye be true men, 
let one of your brethren be bound in the house of your 
prison; go ye, carry corn for the famine of your houses; 
but bring your youngest brother unto me; so shall your 
words be verified, and ye shall not die.'^ 

They listened to him with countenances in which deep 
trouble was showing itself; there was a present partial relief; 
but perplexities, with great additional grief and reproach 
from their father, had yet to be encountered. The p'ower 
of conscience which had been at work in the prison, now 
took words, and they sadly murmured to each other, 

'^ We are verily guilty concerning our brother, in that we 
saw the anguish of his soul when he besought us, and we 
would not hear ; therefore is this distress come upon us.^^ 
Reuben, who, it will be remembered had formed a plan for 
delivering him at Dothan, but which was of course unknown 
to the lad, added now, 

" Spake I not unto you, saying, Do not sin against the 
child ; and ye would not hear ? therefore, behold, also his 
blood is required. ^^ 

Joseph had been conversing with them through an inter- 
preter, and they had no suspicion that he understood what 
they were saying. Their words opened the deep, long-closed 
fountains of his heart, and he could scarcely keep from 
giving his feelings vent before all the company. He went 
out and wept. 

On returning, while still retaining his incognito, he took 
Simeon (next to the oldest), and had him bound before them, 
and then he dismissed them for their homes. Previous to 
their departure he had directed his steward not only to fill 
their sacks with grain, but to put at the mouth of each one 
the bag of silver brought for payment. He may have 
wished to test their honesty in this, or, if they should con- 

19 * 



222 I^IFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

sider the money as a gift, to afford them means for sending 
again without embarrassment to those at home. 

In that long time in Egypt he had, except in a small por- 
tion of his prison-life, been always so intently occupied, that 
new feelings had, in a measure, crowded out those for the 
family in Canaan. There was little, indeed, to make him 
cultivate such remembrances ; for the very affection of his 
father, so ill-judged in its manifestations, had been the chief 
means of his misfortunes there, and had very nearly caused 
him to be murdered by his brothers. The reminiscences were 
so painful that in selecting a name for his oldest son, he chose 
that of 3Ianasseh ; '^ for God,'^ he said, " hath made me 
forget all my toil and all my father's house.'' We are not 
in this justifying such forgetfulness, but merely showing 
how easily it could come to one constantly so full of occupa- 
tion in his new home. 

But the affections were only slumbering, not destroyed. 
The sight of his brothers and one kind word from them, 
roused up all the old tenderness for them, and still more 
for the father; and as soon as he could do so, he gave every 
manifestation of his returned fulness of love. 
' At the close of this first interview, provender for the 
beasts on the return journey had also been supplied ; and 
on the way, one of the brothers, opening his sack for such 
supply, was surprised to find his money there. On his has- 
tc^ning to mention the fact to the others they became greatly 
alarmed. " What," they said in their fear, '^ is this that 
God hath done unto us?" Trouble was leading them 
toward God. 

Jacob in his tent near Hebron was waiting anxiously. 
He had not reason to be confident in those sons ; and by 
and by there seemed to be an unnecessary delay about their 
return. Moveover, before their departure for Egypt, want 
had begun to be felt in all the families at this encampment; 
and it was now beginning to be severe. TIh'v came at last. 



MEETING WITH THE BROTHERS, 223 

— not all, for one was missing. Simeon had become the 
father of six children ; all the encampment hurried around 
the returned nine to listen to their history of the journey ; 
and on its being given there was universal alarm, but 
especially in Jacob's and Simeon's tents. There was some- 
thing mysterious to the apprehension of all in the conduct 
of the Egyptian governor. One thing was plain, — that one 
of their number was still in his power, as a pledge for the 
appearance there of Benjamin; and the old man, they 
feared, would not ever be induced to part with this, the 
youngest of his sons, and, since the loss of Joseph, the 
favorite one. The mystery in the Governor's conduct was 
further increased in their eyes, when, as they now opened 
all their sacks, each was found to contain the owner's bag of 
money at its mouth. It appeared plain to them that some- 
how or other, there was a design against them all. The 
aged father's alarm immediately took chiefly the direction 
of the youngest ; he was borne down by the fearful accu- 
mulations. 

" Me have ye bereaved of my children ; Joseph is not, 
and Simeon is not, and ye will take Benjamin away; all 
these things are against me." Reuben answered, 

" Slay my two sons if I bring him not to thee ; deliver 
him into my hand, and I will bring him to thee again." 
The answer was, 

" My son shall not go down with you ; for his brother is 
dead and he is left alone ; if mischief befall him by the 
way in the which ye go, then shall ye bring down my gray 
"hairs with sorrow to the grave." 



234 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 



CHAPTER XXIV. 
THE FULL RECOGNITION 

TIME passed on. The drought still continued in Canaan, 
and by degrees the grain brought from Egypt to these 
families was all consumed. The food was most carefully 
economized ; for every one knew how desperate must be any 
effort to move the aged man from his resolution not to allow 
Benjamin to go, and how useless and, indeed, how danger- 
ous it would be for them to present themselves without him 
before the Prime Minister of Egypt. To come thus, they 
thought, w^ould be verifying in his eyes the charge that they 
WTre spies. But they all waited for the father to be the 
first to speak, knowing that he must speak in the end ; for 
the want must, at last, become unendurable to every one. 
Indeed, as they saw the faces of all in the encampment grow 
wan and thin, and heard the cries of the children for food 
becoming more frequent and also weaker ; and saw the old 
man's sympathies becoming wider and stronger, they felt 
that his obstinacy must soon appear to himself to be selfish 
and wicked, and would give w^ay. He said at last, briefly, 
as if distrusting himself, fearful of the result : 

"Go again, buy us a little food.'' Judah answered, 
" The man did solemnly protest unto us, saying. Ye shall 
not see my face, except your brother be with you. If thou 
wilt send our brother with us, we will go down and buy 
thee. food; but if thou wilt not send him, we will not go 
down ; for the man said unto us, Ye shall not see my face, 
except your brother be with you." 

Jacob made complaint of their informing the Governor 
that they had a brother; to which Judah replied, explaining 
again the closeness of his infjuiries; and now, seeing the 



THE FULL RECOGNITION. 225 

resolution of the father giving way, he followed up the ap- 
peal from the sad, thin faces all around ; — 

"Send the lad with me and we will arise and go; that we 
may live and not die, both we, and thou, and also our little 
ones f offering also to be surety for him and to take on him- 
self all the father's blame for ever, if he did not restore 
Benjamin to him. 

Jacob yielded, and directed them to get ready for the 
journey. They were to take to the Prime Minister a pre- 
sent of such things as their destitute country could afford, 
" a little balm, and a little honey, spices, myrrh, nuts and 
almonds,^' and also " double money'' in their sacks, — that 
formerly returned, and also some for the present purchase. 

" Take also your brother, and arise, go again unto the 
man ; and God Almighty give you mercy before the man, 
that he may send away your other brother, and Benjamin ; 
if I be bereaved of my children, I am [indeed] bereaved." 

So they went down again into Egypt, taking very good 
care of this youngest brother on the way. Joseph was wait- 
ing, half-expectant and half-doubtful whether they would 
again appear : for it was questionable in his mind whether 
this brother still existed or not. When they appeared be- 
fore him again, he scrutinized them keenly. Was this Ben- 
jamin ? The youngest son was only about two years old 
when he had seen him last ; the word of these men could 
not be fully trusted respecting him, for they had lied in the 
former interview about Joseph himself. Still the Governor, 
even amid doubts, felt his heart yearn toward the young 
man with an instinctive feeling, as if their account of him 
must be true. He made no demonstration, however, more 
than to order the ruler of his house to take them to his pa- 
latial residence, and there to make ready for an entertain- 
ment to them. They were greatly alarmed ; for all the 
actions of the Governor respecting them were suspicious : 
the money returned^ evidently through design, was a mys- 



226 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

tory ; the demand for Benjamin, a mystery ; this present 
honor, a mystery ; they looked at the grand halls of the 
palace and its splendid adornings, the abundance of submis- 
sive servants in every part, and the respectful regard paid 
to themselves, only with one feeling, — a creeping, paralyzing 
fear. They were helpless there, and thought they saw 
proof of designs upon them, and, as they concluded, for no 
good end. Connecting the new events with the return of 
the money in their sacks, as if these might be with some 
purpose of entanglement, they sought the steward of the 
house, and made to him explanations and assertions of their 
innocence resj>ecting the silver. The man satisfied them 
about this ; and their feelings were still more relieved by 
seeing Simeon, now released from prison, added to their 
group. Water was brought them for the necessary ablu- 
tions ; they next prepared their presents, and when the Gov- 
ernor at last rejoined them, they offered these, making 
before him the customary obeisance. Again flashed on his 
mind that dream at home. There had been another dream 
including his father. He hastened now, after the customary 
salutations to themselves, to ask, in assumed calmness, yet 
nervously, about him : 

"Is your father well, the old man of whom ye spake? 
Is he yet alive ?'^ 

" Thy servant our father is in good health, he is yet 
alive,'' they said, with another obeisance. 

" Is this your younger brother, of whom ye spake unto 
me? — God be gracious unto thee, my son;" — but he could 
say no more ; for the look, the address to the young man, 
brought such a gush to his feelings that he could not remain 
without betraying himself. He went out into his private 
chamber, and there let his heart overflow in its tenderness 
and find relief in tears. 

Having recovered himself and removed the marks of his 
weeping, he returned, and or<l<M<Ml the feast to be prepared. 



THE FULL RECOGNITION. 227 

Caste among the Egyptians was very strict, and they never 
ate with people of another nation. Separate tables were 
therefore set for them in the banqueting-hall ; another table 
for Joseph^s brothers ; one alone for him, the High Admin- 
istrator over the kingdom. The brothers remarked with 
surprise the order in which they were seated at table ; Reu- 
ben first, the youngest last, as if the age of the former was 
known. The Governor sent messes to them ; Benjamin^s 
five times as large as any of the others. They all had good 
appetites ; for this meal was such a one as they had never 
seen before, and to which the recent deficiencies at home 
helped to give a new zest. Hope, too, had come into them, 
and a degree of confidence ; and they drank, and, if only 
from respect to their host, tried to let a feeling of joy ful- 
ness have its way in their hearts. 

The Governor's eye w^as quietly, and, as far as it could be 
without creating suspicion, carefully observing them all the 
while. He had reason for observation, and for quiet, unob- 
served inquiry in his mind respecting them. Was this Ben- 
jamin? he was asking of himself. His heart had just filled 
as he looked upon the young man and addressed him, and 
was near overflowing merely at the thought of his being the 
son of that dear mother whom, with her strong love to him- 
self, he remembered so well ; and the features looked as if 
they might belong to such a son ; but he knew these other 
brothers well, and their baseness and lying ; and this might, 
after all, be only a counterfeit brought to him, because they 
had to bring some one with that name. Benjamin might be 
dead, — perhaps killed by them ; or might be at home with 
the father; or the report that their father was yet alive 
might even itself be false. Doubts, when they once enter 
the mind, soon multiply ; and from the character of these 
men, there was really much occasion for doubt. 

Joseph concluded to have further proof. There could be 
no excuse given for detaining them longer ; and he must in 



228 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

all reason let them go ; but before the final dismission, he 
directed the steward of his house to put his chief drinking 
cup of silver into the sack of the youngest, together with the 
money he had brought, concealing them there. 

The eleven departed most joyfully. Simeon was w^ith 
them again; their sacks were full of grain for their needy 
and expectant families; they felt that they had escaped 
safely from those strange mysteries at the Governor's palace ; 
they had been well entertained and highly honored — curious 
truly it all was — but they were safe ! 

As they journeyed on just beyond the precincts of the 
great city, talking about the recent singular events, and all 
of them filled with gladness at the thought of getting safely 
home, they were overtaken by the Prime Minister's stew- 
ard reaching them in great haste. They turned to greet 
him, and may have thought it was perhaps for some new 
honors to be conferred ; some joyful message to carry to 
to their father ; some rich present it might be. No ! his 
words were scathing ! 

" Wherefore have ye rewarded evil for good ? Is not this 
it in which my lord drinketh, and whereby, indeed, he 
divineth? Ye have done evil in so doing.'' They an- 
swered with the honest expression in their faces of wronged 
men, but still with alarm ; another mystery ! 

"Wherefore saith my lord these words? God forbid that 
thy servants should do according to this thing; behold, the 
money which we found in our sacks' mouths, we brou,i!:ht 
again unto thee out of the land of Canaan ; how then should 
we steal out of thy lord's house silver or gold? With 
whomsoever of thy servants it be found, both let him die, 
and we also will be my lord's bond-men." The steward 
said — 

" Now also let it be according unto your words ; he with 
whom it is found shall be my servant ; and ye shall be 
blameless." 



THE FULL RECOGNITION, 229 

They all acted with the promptitude of men consciously 
innocent ; and yet there was a cold fear creeping through 
every heart. So much mystery in that palace ! Some 
strange design doubtless now ! And how easy for a man 
all-powerful as was this Governor, in this way to carry out a 
bad design ! The sacks were all placed on the ground ; 
the steward examined them, beginning with Reuben^s and 
so going down to the sack of the youngest : — 

The cup was found in Benjamin's sack ! 

There was no word from them ; only a mute horror and 
despair. They rent their clothes and laded their animals 
again, and returned to the city. — Along its crowded thorough- 
fares; — among its wan, suffering people, on whom was the 
dull horror of a two years' famine in the land, with the ex- 
pectation of five more yet to come ; — among all the sights of 
abjectness and misery with the sounds of gloom and de- 
spair ; — among all these, there w^as nothing to compare w^ith 
the utter wretchedness of this company, who now in torn 
garments followed the steward toward the great lordly 
palace. They entered its courts and found the Prime 
Minister there, and they fell before him on the ground. 
His countenance showed profound emotion. 

" What deed is this that ye have done ?'' he said. "Wot 
ye not that such a man as I can certainly divine?'' Judah 
answered, 

"What shall we say unto my lord? what shall we speak? 
or how shall we clear ourselves? God hath found out the 
iniquity of thy servants; behold, we are my lord's servants, 
both we and he also with whom the cup is found." He 
replied, 

" God forbid that I should do so ; but the man in whose 
hand the cup is found, he shall be my servant; and as for 
you, get you up in peace unto your father." Judah came 
near to him ; — all formality and distance of respect broken 
through in the intense distress. 
20 



230 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

" O my lord, let thy servant, I pray thee, speak a word 
in my lord's ears, and let not thine anger burn against thy 
servant; for thou art even as Pharaoh. My lord asked his 
servants. Have ye a father or a brother?'^ — and he went on 
briefly over the incidents in their former visit respecting 
these two ; and then the parting of their father with Benja- 
min ; — and he added, 

^' Now therefore, when I come to thy servant my father, 
and the lad be not with us (seeing that his life is bound 
up in the lad's life) ; it shall come to pass, when he seeth 
that the lad is not with us, that he will die ; and thy ser- 
vants shall bring down the gray hairs of thy servant our 
father with sorrow to the grave. For thy servant became 
surety for the lad unto my father, saying. If I bring him 
not unto thee, then I shall bear the blame to my father for 
ever. Now, therefore, I pray thee, let thy servant abide 
instead of the lad a bond-man to my lord ; and let the lad 
go up with his brethren. For how shall I go up to my 
father, and the lad be not with me ? lest, peradventure, I see 
the evil that come on my father.'' 

Joseph could contain his feelings no longer. The offer to 
remain a bond-man in the young man's place, when, if there 
had been an imposition, they might have readily yielded up 
the impostor, satisfied him that this was indeed his youngest 
brother. His heart needed no promptings; he gave orders 
to have all but these men leave the hall ; then he wept 
aloud and cried out — 

*^ I am Joseph ; doth my father yet live ?" 

The brothers stood aghast at the revelation! He, Joseph! 
whom they would liave murdered, w^hom they sold for 
money, who must have long treasured resentments, who had 
plotted and drawn all these mysteries about them, and now 
had them completely in his power ! 

Aghast and mute, they had not a word to say. Conscious 
that he knew them well and all their wickedness, they felt 



THE FULL RECOGNITION, 231 

that it was useless to attempt explanation or excuse. They 
shrunk at the towering greatness of the man even far 
more than they had ever done previously ; for he was now, 
they might suppose, their bitter enemy. They stood, with- 
out a word. He however, quickly spoke : 

" Come near to me, I pray you f and they came near. 
He added, 

" I am Joseph your brother, whom ye sold into Egypt. 
Now therefore be not grieved, nor angry with yourselves, 
that ye sold me hither ; for God did send me before you to 
preserve life/^ — and he went on to state how long the famine 
was yet to last, and God^s goodness in making him an in- 
strument for saving also their race from perishing ; and then 
his thoughts flew back with stirrings of all fond affections 
toward his father and home. They were, he said, to go 
back immediately and bring his father and all that belonged 
to him, descendants and households and flocks and herds 
and retainers, ^^ all,^^ in short, '' that he had.^^ He would 
give them room in Goshen, a choice grazing-ground in 
Egypt, in its low surface moist, and perhaps yet green 
when all the upper valley was like dust; that should be 
their home under his protection, and he was now able to 
protect any whom he might choose. 

Such words came from him no longer in calm or lordly 
style ; for his heart was full of tenderness, and he could wait 
in it only to reassure them. '^ Then he fell upon his brother 
Benjamin^s neck, and wept ; and Benjamin wept with him 
upon his neck. Moreover, he kissed all his brethren and wept 
upon them; and after that his brethren talked with him." 

Reports of all this soon reached Pharaoh's ears. The 
strange circumstances previously attending the advent of 
these men, and especially the steward's orders respecting 
them, had made them objects of close attention, and had 
sharpened men's ears, and the bursts of feeling at the recog- 
nitions had been overheard ; now, the great news that the 



232 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT, 

Prime Minister's brothers were in the palace induced action 
from Pharaoh himself. The monarch might well take an 
interest in everything connected with Joseph ; for this was 
now the second year of the prevalence of the famine, and 
proofs had multiplied every day, that his wise foresight had 
truly saved the nation from extinction. Pharaoh, but for 
him, would have ruled over an utter solitude, if he had 
ruled at all ; — over a land strewn with festering corpses, 
with not a live being left, — all life of man or beast extinct. 
Five years were yet to come ; but the granaries were still 
abundant in stores. There was suffering, and over all the 
country was a heavy gloom, and there would be more ; but 
this was not extinction, as would have been but for this 
wise and great man, in his greatness not haughty, in his 
power unassuming and gentle, though firm ; even the cour- 
tiers had given up their jealousy in the universally felt relief 
through his wisdom ; and they now also united with the 
monarch in the gratification at the presence of his brothers. 
Pharaoh sent for him, and gave directions that from the 
royal magazines of chariots and other conveniences for 
travel, everything necessary should be furnished for bring- 
ing the whole Israelite people, with their dependants, down 
to Egypt, where — so Joseph was authorized to say to them 
— " I will give you the good of the land of Egypt, and ye 

shall eat the fat of the land Regard not your stuff, 

for the good of all the land of Egypt is yours." 

The men were furnished accordingly. To each of them 
Joseph also gave changes of raiment; to Benjamin, five 
changes and three hundred pieces of silver ; for his father 
he sent " ten asses, laden with the good things of Egypt, 
and ten she-asses laden with corn and bread and meat^ for 
the journey. Fearful that the new prosperity and the dis- 
tinctions might give rise again to jealousies and dissensions, 
he gave to his brothers, as they were leaving, the significant 
advice, ^^ See that ye fall not out by the way/' 



JACOB IN EGYPT, 233 



CHAPTER XXV. 
JACOB IN EGYPT, 

AT Hebron^ a very strange sight not long after this, 
greeted the eyes of the people. It consisted of a 
succession of wagons, — a vehicle scarcely known in that 
country of hills and nomads, — and with these, long lines 
of asses laden with choice articles of food and raiment, all 
more particularly remarkable in this time of poverty and 
drought. Crowds of lookers-on gathered, as they had 
gathered before, on the return of this company from Egypt, 
but not now, as then, with feelings ending in dismay ; for 
men swift of foot had spread the news that all the brothers 
were there, Simeon and Benjamin, as well as the rest; and 
gladly answered the rapidly-put questions, as to what that 
wonderful sight of the approaching w^agons could mean. 
Soon Jacob himself, — an old man now, and tottering with 
age, was among them. He was scarcely allowed time to ask 
what this meant, for the cry rung in his ears, — 

''- Joseph is yet alive, and he is Governor over all the land 
of Egypt r 

The old man did not believe w^hat he heard ; yet the 
words were so thrilling that they brought a coldness and 
faintness to his heart. The announcement, though there 
might seem to be no possibility of truth in it, was sufficient 
to be an ice-bolt sent through him, so abrupt was it, and 
unexpected, and strange. But as the sudden faintness passed 
off, his eyes took in the scene of wagons and great lines of 
loaded animals ; and moreover Benjamin was soon by his 
side, and he felt reassured. Then they recounted to him all 
Joseph's words, and told him of the glory of his lost son, 
the most powerful lord in that land. But all the lordship 
20 * 



234 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

and power and glory in Egypt were of little moment to the 
old man's heart compared with the simple fact of his son's 
living; the strong tide of his affection swallowed up every- 
thing else. To their descanting on what their eyes had seen 
of the splendors and honors concentrating on Joseph, he 
answered in his one thought, 

'^ It is enough ; Joseph my son is yet alive ; I will go 
and see him before I die/' 

The preparations were soon made; for the life of a 
nomad is so simple that at any time they can quickly be 
ready for moving ; and the aged father was anxious to be 
gone. No one held back; for all the others were desirous 
to be, as soon as possible, connected with the richness and 
glory of the Egyptian court. The news had spread rapidly 
among the Canaanites around them, and the admiration and 
wonder and envy of these neighbors stimulated still more 
the self-gratification of the Israelites ; while the famine left 
no desire to remain in that land. So the whole tribe w^as 
soon in motion, not only the direct descendants of the aged 
chief or sheikh, and their wives ; but also his retainers, who 
must have been numerous and also glad to go. We know 
that Abraham had among his adherents three hundred and 
eighteen men fit to bear arms, and also that all the males 
among his people, whether purchased or born there, were 
subjected to the Jewish rite,' and consequently were con- 
sidered a part of his tribe or nation. Jacob had probably 
as large a tribe, probably much larger (see Gen. xxxvi. 7), 
and it would now have been great cruelty to leave them 
here in want when abundance for him and them was offered 
in Egyj)t. Therefore undoubtedly they accompanied him, 
making the Israelite nation going down into that country 
far more numerous than his own immediate family. This 
subject is an important one in connection with the question 



1 See Gen. xvii. 23. 



JACOB IN EGYPT, 235 

sometimes started respecting the great increase of the Israel- 
ites in Egypt. 

Driving the cattle and flocks before them, and with the 
aged chief and the women and children in the numerous 
wheel conveyances, the whole company moved on toward 
Egypt in highest gladness, with songs and instrumental 
music and shouts such as only such general joy could in- 
spire. They took, however, not the most direct route by 
the coast, but by Beersheba, to which Jacob could scarcely 
expect ever to have another opportunity of making a visit. 
We know that his affections were peculiarly strong ; and 
they are the great redeeming quality amid the subtleties and 
deceptions in his earlier life. For these deceptions he had 
paid dearly ; and the recent disclosures of his sons' wicked- 
ness toward himself brought up before him his own mis- 
deeds toward his father at Beersheba with self-convicting 
and humbling effect. There, too, he had felt that all-absorb- 
ing love of his mother never once forgotten, and which had 
made his own heart so rich in the affections toward all 
human beings and especially toward Jehovah. So now he 
took his way by Beersheba ; and there " he offered sacrifices 
to the God of his father Isaac.'^ And here in a vision the 
divine word came to him, bidding him not fear to go into 
Egypt, for God would go with him and make of him there 
a great nation ; adding also that his going there would not 
be a forfeiting of the right obtained by the ^promise to give 
this land of Canaan to his descendants. 

Thence he hurried onward toward Egypt ; and when ap- 
proaching it he sent Judah before him to announce to Joseph 
his coming, and to have preparations made for this large 
company, according to promise, in the land of Goshen. This 
region is at the north-eastern extremity of Egypt, and at a 
part where the waters of the Nile spread out in great arms 
in their approach toward the sea, and make vast deltas or 
inland islands, all having the exuberant fertility of the rest 



236 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

of Egypt. The ground being generally low and moist, 
was better adapted then, as it still is, for grass than for 
grain, and not only was the region thus a choice one for 
grazing, but it was also more distinct and separated from the 
great body of the country. We must not imagine it, how- 
ever, to be a solitary region, for it was far different, as across 
it were the great thoroughfares to Canaan and Arabia, and 
there also, probably at its northern edge near the sea, was 
a vast fortress of defence, Avaris, erected against hostile 
incursions from those countries. 

Joseph came to meet his father. His road led him by 
On, and along the great highway by which he had been 
brought down into Egypt ; and thoughts of that sad jour- 
ney, and of his young resolves on the way, and of his look- 
ing to God for help when God was all that w^as left to him, 
all now crowded on his recollection. Then his thoughts 
turned to the coming interview ; and the old love, so long 
kept down, sprung up again more sober now, but begin- 
ning to be even stronger than in those early days. How 
would that father look now ? he thought ; and memory pic- 
tured him as in former times, a grand-looking man, though 
already gray-haired and with face marked with care and 
with troubles caused by his oldest sons, but yet with eyes 
always beaming toward himself, in the true and warm affec- 
tion filling his heart. They were to meet; — and the heart 
of the great C^overnor of Egypt grew childlike at the 
thought. 

Jacob came on, indeed an old man now and tottering and 
weak, but in one thing young and firm and strong, — the 
love for his favorite boy. How slowly to him the vehicle 
that bore him moved on ! Plow long was the road ! New 
and inviting objects everywhere met his eyes, and crowds of 
faces on the great highway, and varied costumes, but he 
saw them not. The loud sounds of his cattle-drivers, iha 
music of instruments pil)ing joyfully on this happy journey, 



JACOB IN EGYPT. 237 

the voices of his children and grandchildren were in his 
ears^ but he heard them not ; memory was stirred up, and 
his mind^s eye was now only upon that stripling who had 
climbed his knee in the old times and had fondled upon 
him ; and his mental ear heard only the lively prattle and 
the witty sallies of the boy who had been so long the 
charm in all his tent-life; — the son so strangely lost and 
now so strangely found, and whom he was about to see once 
more ! 

The road seemed interminable, but the long distances 
were finally left behind them, and the old man at last knew 
that a larger crowd than usual was coming toward him : 
then there were runners ahead in gayest liveries clearing 
the way : then there were loud voices, proclaiming, '' Bow 
the knee,^^ and the Egyptian throngs at the wayside were 
kneeling in humility : then a high chariot, gorgeous in 
silver and gold and canopied over with gay silks, appeared. 
But Jacob saw in all this grandeur but one object — his son ! 
Joseph, too, had no need of any one to inform him which 
was his father, for his hearths instincts alone would have 
told him ; " he fell on his neck, and wept on his neck a 
good while. And Israel said unto Joseph, Now let me 
die, since I have seen thy face, because thou are yet 
alive.^^ 

There was, afterward, a large gathering of the curious, half- 
eager, half-shrinking, confident yet timid, company around 
the Prime Minister to receive his salutations and to offer 
theirs ; many wonderings by the little folks at the gorgeous 
chariot and gay sights ; and many speculations by the elders 
as to their future in this strange country ; and Benjamin 
made conspicuous among all the brethren by Joseph's 
marked and earnest attentions to him ; and then finally, after a 
period of rest and of enjoyment among all in this most happy 
meeting, Joseph returned to Memphis, taking with him five 
of his brothers to present them to Pharaoh, and to receive 



238 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT, 

from the monarch a grant of land for their residence. He 
instructed them on the road what to say to Pharaoh in an- 
swer to his inquiries, so that they might be assigned to this 
distinct and separate place of Goshen, where they would not 
come into collision with the prejudices of the Egyptians 
against men in their employment ; '' For every shepherd,'' 
he said to them, " is an abomination unto the Egyptians.'' 
Accordingly, when taken before the sovereign, in answer to 
his question, " What is your occupation ?" they replied, 
" Thy servants are shepherds, both we and also our fathers," 
and they tendered their request for Goshen ; to which he 
answered to Joseph, '' Thy father and thy brethren are come 
unto thee ; the land of Egypt is before thee ; in the best of 
the land make thy father and brethren to dwell ; in the land 
of Goshen let them dwell ; and if thou knowest any men 
of activity among them, then make them rulers over my 
cattle." 

Not long afterward, the Prime Minister brought up his 
father himself to be presented to Pharaoh. The old man 
was an entire stranger to all the magnificence and grandeur, 
and to the pomps of royalty, among which he was now in- 
troduced ; yet the venerable sheikh bore himself with dig- 
nity and ease. Indeed, the immense city, with all its archi- 
tectural splendor, and the gorgeousness of the monarch's 
palace itself, were not adapted to overawe a man brought up 
in the wild freedom of mountains and valleys outlined by 
God's hand, and where he saw God everywhere, while 
heaven's dome was the fitting vault to this palace of the 
Almighty, not made with hands : and these crowded streets, 
where men seemed to be stifled for want of air, and to be in 
a i)rison-house, could not but compare unfiworably with the 
wide, open views and the freedom in the shepherd-life. 
The old man could stand proudly before the king in the 
consciousness that this son by his side was far greater in true 
worth than the l^haraoh ; and had indeed, through the Al- 



JACOB IN EGYPT, 339 

mighty hand, saved the king and his whole nation from 
destruction. 

So the venerable sheikh raised his hands, as he might well 
do, and blessed Pharaoh. The latter, struck by the snow- 
white locks and the white, long beard of the patriarch, such 
unusual sights in Egypt, inquired, 

^^ How old art thou V^ Jacob answered, 

'^ The days of the years of my pilgrimage are an hun- 
dred and thirty years : few and evil have the days of the 
years of my life been, and have not attained unto the days 
of the years of the life of my fathers in the days of their 
pilgrimage/^ 

After bestowing another blessing he withdrew from the 
presence of the monarch, who must have been greatly im- 
pressed with the appearance and bearing of the old man. 
If Jacob was proud of his son, the son also had good reason 
to be proud of his father. 

The land of Goshen was allotted to the tribe, where they 
spread about, getting such pasturage for their flocks as the 
herbage, scant even in that usually moist region, could afibrd. 
The country bordered closely upon On ; and it was easy for 
Joseph personally to see to their wants ; he took care that 
they should all be well supplied during the whole contin- 
uance of this dreadful famine. 

The famine was indeed eating up all resources, and threat- 
ening the entire vitality of the land. Five years of it still 
remained ; and as it went on, month after month in dreary 
succession, the sufferings of the inhabitants became more and 
more intensified, until they felt that life itself was scarcely 
endurable. The Scriptures express the condition rightly : 
" The land of Egypt and all the land of Canaan fainted by 
reason of the famine.'^ 

The Governor still continued his system of selling grain 
instead of pauperizing the feelings of the people by a free 
gift ; but eventually the money of the inhabitants had all 



240 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

been gathered into the royal coffers. Then they brought 
their cattle and exchanged them for corn for their families, 
the cattle themselves indeed thin and scarcely able to sup- 
port life on the scanty herbage in the less dried-up spaces of 
the Delta ; thus also cattle and sheep and asses and horses 
became the property of the king. Then, as the palpitating 
misery still dragged its way along, only horror, only want, 
only wretchedness over the whole country, and utter ruin 
except the relief in the store-houses, the people came to sell 
themselves to the monarch. 

" We will not hide it from my lord,^^ they said to Joseph, 
" how that our money is spent ; my lord also hath our herds 
of cattle : there is not aught left in the sight of my lord, 
but our bodies and our lands : wherefore shall we die before 
thine eyes, both we and our land ? buy us and our land for 
bread, and we and our land will be servants unto Pharaoh : 
and give us seed, that we may live and not die, that the 
land be not desolate.^' 

The monarch thus became possessor in fee simple of the 
whole land ; Joseph also had the people removed to the 
cities, where he could more easily supply them with food ; 
and thus also he broke up local attachments and helped to 
bring the inhabitants more completely under the control of 
the sovereign, the necessity for which will appear in our 
succeeding chapter. The priests, however, were excepted 
from this sale of lands; they were already sufficiently at- 
tached to the ruler and needed no further subjecting influ- 
ences ; so their sup|)lies from the store-houses were continued 
as a free gift, which in their peculiar condition they could 
also accept without too much humiliation of heart. 

But those seven horril)le years, seemingly endless, were 
gone at la-st. The nation so beat down by despair and suf- 
fering liad scarcely energy enough left in the last of the 
])eriod to look for a better time ; and when it came and the 
river rose, and got to be yet higher and higher, and then to 



JACOB IN EGYPT. 2\\ 

the listless eyes presented the old spectacle of a wide deluge 
in which the rich deposits were, they knew, settling quietly 
— even perhaps in more fruitful abundance than usual — the 
hearts of the people remained crushed and their voices were 
yet hollow and unnatural; so familiar had suffering and 
despair got to be to every one, and so unwonted was any 
other sentiment. 

When now Joseph opened the store-houses freely to issue 
to the inhabitants grain for sowing once more, and told them 
that for the future he would exact from them for Pharaoh 
a fifth of the produce as a toll on their lands, and spoke of 
their wives and little ones whom the remaining four-fifths 
would cheer, they had only energy enough left in their 
numbed feelings to answer submissively, 

" Thou hast saved our lives ; let us find grace in the 
sight of my lord and we will be Pharaoh^s servants/^ 

By degrees, however, as the grain sprung up, and the 
whole great valley turned once more green in the growing 
crops, and far and wide the waving harvests invited the 
sickle, the vitality of the nation reasserted itself, and hope 
and cheerfulness and at last joy came back to the people of 
Egypt. Year after year of fruitfulness began to wipe out the 
remembrances of past horrors ; and in the mean time, down 
at Goshen prosperity and rapid increase were also attending 
the late immigrants there. Jacob lived on in a happy old 
age, seeing his descendants and also his tribe of retainers 
multiply ; the latter and his own posterity, indeed, made 
one by their common faith and the common peculiar rite or- 
dained by heaven. He saw also the flocks and herds in- 
creasing and spreading in vast numbers over the fruitful 
pastures : but, among all these sights Jacob did not feel that 
this was or could be the permanent home of his people ; 
and all these rich, wide plains, even with Joseph near, could 
not produce a home feeling to him. Then, finally, after 
seventeen years in the new land, — a period of that calmness 

21 



242 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

and that quiet and respectful attention and affection which 
old age loves so well, — the patriarch, knowing that the time 
for his departure to a far better than earthly home w^as 
drawing nigh, sent for Joseph, and exacted from him an 
oath that, after death, his body should be taken back to 
Canaan. 

'^ Deal kindly and truly with me ; bury me not, I pray 
thee, in Egypt ; but I wdll lie with my fathers, and thou 
shalt carry me out of Egypt, and bury me in their burying- 
place/^ 

Not long afterward it was told the Governor that his 
father was ill ; and taking his two sons Manasseh and 
Ephraim, with him, he hurried down to Goshen, to his 
bedside. The patriarch was far gone in the disease, but 
when told that Joseph was there, he rallied his strength and 
sat up .; and after some words to his son, the two lads were 
brought before him. Sight had already grown so dim that 
he did not recognize them and had to ask their names ; but 
love was as strong as ever, and he proceeded to give his 
blessing to all three, — Joseph and his boys. The latter had 
been placed by their father according to age, the elder one, 
Manasseh, on his right, and Ephraim on the left ; but 
Jacob in the divine inspiration within him, crossed his 
hands, and although warned of his mistake, still continued 
to give the chief blessing to the younger ; (just as far subse- 
quest events in Canaan justified). To all he said, 

"God, before whom my fathers Abraham and Isaiic did 
walk, the God which fed me all my life long unto this day, 
the ann;el which redeemed me from all evil, bless the lads; 
and let my name be named on them, and the name of my 
fathers Abraham and Isaac; and let them grow into a mul- 
titude in the midst of the earth." 

Then he sent for his remaining sons, and when they had 
gathered around his bed, lie uttered through the divine 
afHatus a peculiar prophecy respectint; each one, having 



\ 



JACOB IN EGTPT, 243 

reference chiefly to the position which their posterity would 
have after the final occupation of Canaan. That to Judah 
is particularly remarkable, showing that in this tribe would 
eventually be the seat of royal power ; and that it would so 
continue until Shiloli ^ should come, when the sceptre would 
depart. For Benjamin the father's affection, if left to itself, 
would have been glad to predict a magnificent future; it 
was, however. He '^ shall raven as a wolf; in the morning 
he shall devour the prey, and at night he shall divide the 
spoil.'^ The tribe did, indeed, afterward show itself to be 
one of violence ; but it was an honored tribe ; for Saul, the 
first king, came from it; subsequently also the Christian 
Paul, in whom the remarkable energy of the tribe became 
chastened into forming the grand apostle for Christ. 

So the end of Jacob had come. After these predictions, 
he charged his sons to take his body, after death, back to 
Canaan, and to bury him in the cave of Machpelah, to rest 
there with the remains of his progenitors. The great wall 
at Hebron, which w^e have already spoken of, doubtless 
encloses the spot where reposed his remains, and where, if 
violence has not been used toward them, they may possibly 
still remain ; for the Egyptian embalming, as we know, is 
an effectual security against decay. 

"And Joseph fell upon his father's face and wept upon 
him and kissed him/' — that face now so calm and placid, 
but which had so often been lighted up in the strong affec- 
tions for him. Then he gave directions to the embalmers. 
News of the death had been extended all over Egypt, where 



1 nVty a word considered by Christians as referring to the Messiah. 
Various explanations of it have been given : 1, at? a proper name, " till 
they come to Shiloh ;" 2, as an appellative, the " bringer of peace /^ till the 
" bringer of peace comes ;" 3, as in the ancient versions, which regard it 
as compounded of \^ contracted from ^\^^ and nS, equal to iS to him, both 
being equivalent to " which belongs to him ;" — the meaning therefore being 
*' till he comes to whoon it (the sceptre or dominimi) belongs.^^ 



244 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

the sympathy with their Governor who had saved their own 
lives was general ; the Egyptians mourned for him seventy 
days. 

But among the mourners for the aged patriarch were ten 
men, in whom also a cold fear was mingled with their grief. 
Those brothers of Joseph had not learned, in those seven- 
teen years in Egypt, to understand him ; and their guilty 
hearts whispered to them that, now the restraint of the 
father^s presence being taken away, he might visit on them 
their fell purposes of old in regard to himself. They 
judged him too much by their own bad hearts. In shame, 
or through fear, they did not dare to appear before him, but 
sent a messenger : 

" Thy father did command before he died, saying. So 
shall ye say unto Joseph, Forgive, I pray thee now, the 
trespass of thy brethren, and their sin ; for they did unto 
thee evil : and now we pray thee, forgive the trespass of the 
servants of the God of thy father.'^ 

The message so full of distrust, and with his father^s 
name, overcame him to tears ; and on this indication they 
came themselves and fell before him with the words, 

" Behold, we be thy servants;'^ — they had indeed become 
abject. He reassured them ; 

*' Fear not; for am I in the place of God? But as for 
you, ye thought evil against me ; but God meant it unto 
good, to bring to pass as it is this day, to save much people 
alive. Now therefore, fear ye not : T will nourish you and 
your little ones." 

There was great nobleness in this reassurance of them, by 
placing it not on the ground of any magnanimity in him- 
self, but because God had a purpose in tlieir act, for the 
safety of another nation as well as of themselves ; he further 
tried to give them confidence by words of kindness and 
peace. 

When the seventy days of general demonstrations of 



JACOB IN EGYPT. 345 

grief in Egypt had expired^ he sent a message to Pharaoh ; 
— for in his mourning habiliments he could not, according to 
their usages, present himself before the monarch — stating 
his father's request and his oath, and asking an interval in 
which to perform his duty of the burial in Canaan. Not 
only was it readily granted, but also a large concourse of 
the " servants of Pharaoh, the elders of his house, and all 
the elders of the land of Egypt,'' prepared to bear him com- 
pany, and assist in the ceremonies. The Israelitish families, 
except the children, of course made a part of the procession, 
which was further rendered imposing by the chariots and 
horsemen, the whole forming ^^a very great company." 
Thus they moved on, a long train attracting attention every- 
where along the plains of Egypt ; then they crossed the 
intervening sands; and finally they reached the borders of 
Canaan. The threshing-floor of Atad was by their way, 
after reaching the latter country ; and here they paused for 
seven days to express their grief among these people^ and 
"mourn with a great and very sore lamentation;" the place 
had the name afterward of Abel-mizi^aim, " the mourning of 
the JEgyptians,^^^ so much did the concourse of servants and 
nobles and elders of Pharaoh's palace make the whole scene 
appear to be Egyptian. 

We have comparatively little afterward respecting Jo- 
seph, in this strange, eventful history. We know that he 
returned to Egypt and lived there, " he and his father's 
house ;" that he survived his father fifty-four years, and died 
aged one hundred and ten, after having seen " Ephraim's 



1 Our version of the Scriptures says, "which is beyond Jordan," seeming 
to convey the idea that this was on the east of that river ; but in 1 Kings 
iv. 24, the same Hebrew expression is twice translated, " on this side the 
river," which the connection there shows indeed to be the true meaning. 
A journey, in this case, to any spot east of Jordan, would have been a very 
circuitous one. 
21 * 



246 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

children of the third generation/^ When he was about to 
die he said to his kinsmen, " God will surely visit you, and 
bring you out of this land, unto the land which he sware 
to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob ;'^ and he took an oath 
of them, ^^ God will surely visit you, and ye shall carry up 
my bones from hence/^ His body was embalmed and 
placed in a coffin in the usual Egyptian manner; — and 
afterward, through long years of suffering among the Israel- 
ites, — when rulers arose " who knew not Joseph,^^ and the 
enslaved descendants of those whom he had brought to this 
land were groaning in most bitter bondage, — they still 
thought with hope of this coffin, keeping a careful record 
of its place of deposit; and solaced themselves with the 
expression of the deceased great man, that the time was 
surely coming when, God visiting them, they were to bear that 
body to their nation's promised home in Canaan, It got at 
last to be their only earthly hope. 



CHAPTER XXVI. 
FROM JOSEPH TO MOSES, 

WE have now before us a long period of obscurity re- 
specting the Israelites, in which we catch only glimpses 
of them, but those glimpses extremely interesting, inasmuch 
as the subject ends in that great disruption from Egypt, the 
Exodus. The monuments' afford us the means of knowing 
much of the Egyptian history of that period ; and as there 
is, of course, a parallelism between Egyptian events and 
those among the Hebrew race, we turn to the former to ask 



* The render will not be misled by the word. It means temples, halls, 
&c., &c, — monuments of antiquity. 



FROM JOSEPH TO MOSES. 



HI 




HORUS I. (Har. Ra-usr-kheper, u.) The superstitious Pharaoh, thought to be the one 
'•' which knew not Joseph." 

{Copied by careful tracing from Lepsius' work.) 



248 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT, 

what enlightenment they can give us respecting the Israel- 
ites during those times ? In questioning them, however, we 
must be careful to remember that these records were made 
by the monarchs themselves, each for his own reign; and 
that as they were designed to glorify that reign, or the coun- 
try, we need not expect to find there anything of a disastrous 
kind to either; also we may have occasion sometimes to form 
our conclusions more from strange deficiencies in these public 
records, than from what is actually given. Bearing this 
in our mind, we shall perhaps find on the monuments very 
striking elucidations of this obscure, because brief, portion 
of the Scripture history. 

The first monarch after Joseph's death appears to have 
been Horus I., the proofs of which we here append in a foot- 
note, in order not to interrupt the course of our narrative.^ 
He was just the kind of person concerning whom a faithful 
historical record would be apt to say, " Now there arose up a 
new king which knew not Joseph ;" by which doubtless we 
are to understand, not one who was ignorant of Joseph's great 



^ Chronology is one of the most difficult, and is often the most unsatis- 
factory, of all subjects coming under the notice of a historian. It is also a 
dry topic to the reader, but we must enter upon it if we wish to study these 
elucidations from the monuments. 

We are brought first to an examination of the interval between the com- 
ing of Jacob into Egypt and the period of the Exodus. In Saint Paul's 
Epistle to the Galatians, ch. iii. 16, 17, the time between the former 
and the giving of the Law is stated at 430 years. Josephus (Antiq. ii. 
15, ^ 2), gives the Exodus as " 430 years after our forefather Abraliam 
came into Canaan, but 215 years only after Jacob removed into Egypt." 
In Antiq. viii. 3, § 1, he makes the interval nearly the same, 428 years: 
in Antiq. ii. 9, 1, he gives it as 400 years. In Ex. xii. 40, as read in 
our Hebrew Bible, it is stated, " Now the sojourning of the children of 
Israel who dwelt in Egypt was four liundred and thirty years;" but the 
Beptuagint gives the same passage thus: " Now the sojourning of the chil- 
dren of Israel which they sojourned in the land of Egypt and in the land 
of Canaan wius four hundred and thirty years:" 'H 6i KurdiKnaig ruiv vuotf 

*l<Tpaf}\ h^ KarojKrjaav iv y?\ AiyvTru) Kal iv yi] "Kavaav, trr) rSTpaKoaiav rpiaKOVTa* 

The Samaritan Pentateuch, which must have belonged to a period earlier 



FROM JOSEPH TO MOSES, 249 

services to the nation, but who wished to make no recognition 
of them ; and under the pressure of present fear and sel- 
fish prejudice, desired as much as possible to bury them in 
oblivion. Bunsen, drawing the character of Horus from 
the monuments, describes him as " a superstitious sovereign, 



than 975 B. C. (the date of the revolt of the ten tribes), gives this passage 
exactly in the same manner as the Septuagint. In Gen. xv. 13, the time 
of servitude is set down at 400 years ; but this may perhaps be considered 
as the whole time of being " strangers," and thus under the control of 
others in the strange lands. The other passages bearing on this subject, 
Ex. vi. 16-19 and Num. xxv. 57-59, are of uncertain meaning, inasmuch 
as we do not know the estimate for a generation ; but they seem to incline 
to the estimate of 215 years between JacoVs coming into Egypt and the 
Exodus. 

After weighing this evidence, we take the last record given in the Scrip- 
tures, that of St. Paul, with which the other evidence coincides, or may 
be explained so as to agree, and estimate the time between Abraham^ s coming 
into Egypt and the Exodus at 430 years. We have, then, after Abraham's 
so coming, an interval to the birth of Isaac 25 years ; then to the birth of 
Jacob 60 years ; and 130 years to the immigration of the latter ; making in 
all 215 years ; and leaving 215 from that immigration to the Exodus. Joseph 
died cd. 110 years ; 71 after the immigration, and 144 before the Exodus. 

We will now connect these dates with those of the Egyptian kings ; and 
inquire whether from both we may not be able to ascertain who were on 
the throne at the times of Scriptural events ? For we know that the dis- 
tinctive character of these Pharaohs must have had important influence on 
such events. In making out the lists and dates of sovereigns who ruled 
over that country, Egyptologists have been guided — I. By "the Tablet 
at Abydos" (discovered in 1818 and carefully copied — it has since been 
defaced), on which had been cut a series of monarchs, 1^ in number, 
who are represented seated under their cartouches ; II. By a tablet at 
Karnak containing a series of 61 kings disposed in four lines around the 
walls: III. By the Lists of Manetho, as we have them preserved by 
Josephus and other ancient writers. Bunsen considers the tablet at 
Abydos as "the surest test of every attempt to restore the dynasties," 
which we are now considering. From this and a comparison with other 
monuments and sources of information, he has constructed a list of 
sovereigns and the time of reign to each, which appears as if it might 
be safely taken as authority. The following will show us the result, to 
which also is attached part of the list from Manetho, as quoted by Josephus, 
beginning after the expulsion of the Shepherd-kings : 



250 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

devoted to the priests, and a contemplative enthusiast." 
The edifices which he erected in Egypt are in the best archi- 
tectural style, but the sculptures on them are of a mystic 
and religious tendency ; and it was by his order that before 
one of the temples at Thebes was made that splendid avenue 



Bunsen's list from the Tablet of Abydos and other 
monuments. 



Amosis (Aahmes, Ra-nab-peh) 

Amenophis I. (Amenhapt. Ra-ser-ka 

Tuthinosis I. (Tetmes. Ra-aa-khe-per-ka), 

cousin and brother-in-law of No. 2 

Tuthmosis II. (Tetmes. Ra-aa-en-kheper)... 
Tuthmosis III. (Tetmes. Ra-men-kheper), 

brotlier of No. 4 

Amenophis II. (Amenkept. Ra-aa-kheper- 

ru), son of No. 5 

Tutlimosis IV. (Tetmes. Ra-aa-men-khe- 

peru), son of No. 6 

Amenophis III. (Amenkept. Ra-neb-ma-t), 

son of No. 7 

Horus, (son of No. 8. Har. Ra-usr-kheper-u). 

Ramesses I. (Ramessu. Ra-men-peh) 

Sethos I. (Seti. Ra-men-Ma.t), son of No. 10 
Ramesses II. (Ramessu. Ra-usr-Ma.t), son 

of No. 11 

Menephthah (Mari-en-ptheh. Ba-en Ra). 



Time 

of 
Reign. 



Years. 
25 
13 

21 
22 

26 



37 
32 



12 
66 



Manetho's lists (See Jose- 
phus. Con. Ap. I. § 15). 



Tethmosis 

Chebron 

Amenophis 

Amesses (female)... 

Mephres 

Meperamuthosis .... 

Tethmosis 

Amenophis 

Orus 

Acenchres (female) 
Rathosis 



Acencheres [I] ... 

■ ■ [ll]- 



Acencheres 
Armais.... 

Ramesses 

Armesses Miamoun 
Amenophis 



Reigned. 



Years, 
25 
13 
20 
21 
12 
25 
9 

30 
36 
12 
9 

12 
12 
4 
1 

66 
19 



Moa. 
4 

7 

9 

9 
10 

8 
10 

5 

1 



The Amenophis of Manetho it will be observed is the same as 
Menephthah in the other list. Bunsen supposes that the Exodus occurred 
in the 6th year of his reign : consequently, going back from that date we 
perceive that Joseph was made governor of Egypt about the fourth year 
of Tuthmosis III., and that he died in the 18th year of Amenophis III., 
or 19 years before the accession of Horus. The birth of Moses would be 
about the fourth year of Sethos I. : and his flight to Arabia in the thirty- 
first year of Ramesses II. as Pharaoh. 

Chronologists difier respecting the time of the Exodus ; Hale making it 
to be 1648 B. C, Usher 1491, Bunsen 1320, Poole 1652. The reader 
will probably be gratified if, instead of being asked to accept any of these 
dates simply on the authority of those names, he can have placed within 
liis reach materials for coming to a determination for himself; which 
may be done from the Bible, with only one other reference, nan\ely to Jose- 
phua, who seems to be competent authority in this case. Josephus says 
(Bel. vi. 10), that from David's getting possession of Jerusalem to the 
destruction of that city by the Romans, was 1179 years. Jerusalem was 
destroyed A. D. 70 ; therefore the former event was 1109 B. C. David 
died after reigning in the city 33 years (1 Kings ii. 11): and four years 
after his death Solomon commenced building the temple (lb. vi. 1)) ; that 
is B. C. (1109-37) 1072. The Exodus was 480 years before this (lb. vi. 



FROM JOSEPH TO MOSES, 25 1 

of colossal ram-headed sphinxes raised on pedestals of most 
costly workmanship, of which figures Eossellini counted 
fifty on each side in a distance of fifty paces. It was doubt- 
less of him that Manetho, writing about a succeeding king, 
Menephthah, says, " This king was desirous to become a 
spectator of the gods, as had Orus, one of his predecessors 
in that kingdom, desired the same before him." ^ Another 
peculiar reason for jealousy on the part of Horus respecting 
the foreign race of the Israelites might well arise from the 
fact that in his time there was a rival for the throne in the 
person of an elder brother, whose title on the monuments 
signifies " a worshipper of the sun^s disk,'^ and who intro- 
duced the worship of the visible disk of the sun into his 
new capital in Upper Egypt. 

We are prepared to expect of such a monarch, so situated, 
a record that he knew not Joseph; and to learn that ^^he 
said unto his people. Behold the people of the children of 
Israel are more and mightier than we. Come on, let us 
deal wisely w^th them, lest they multiply, and it come to 
pass that when there falleth out any war, they join also unto 
our enemies, and fight against us, and so get them out of 
the land." 

The Israelites had already become very numerous. We 
have seen that Jacob must have brought dow^n with him not 
only his own immediate descendants, but also his retainers, 
who had by the peculiar rite of his people become a part of 
his tribe; and ^4he children of Israel," we are informed, 
" were fruitful and increased abundantly, and multiplied, 
and waxed exceeding mighty ; and the land was filled with 



1), conseqiientlv B. C. 1552. To this we add 430 years, the interval back 
to Abraham's visit to Egypt, making 1982 ; and then allowing 25 years to 
the birth of Isaac, and 25 additional for Isaac's age at the opening chapter 
'in this book, and we have 1932 B. C, or 3800 years ago, as is there 
specified. 

^ Josephus, Con. Ap. I 26. 



252 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

them.'^ Under the Pharaoh of Jacob's advent they had 
been advanced by their monarch's desire to places of trust ; 
and subsequently they had received Joseph's fostering care ; 
and already they were beginning to be a source of fear to 
the Egyptians. From the causes just mentioned, they had 
spread widely over the land ; while toward the inhabitants 
they had no affinities in customs or religion, keeping them- 
selves a distinct race, and, it might seem, ready, sooner or 
later, to enact over again the former Hyksos rule. They 
had, however, become too useful to be spared. They were 
already beginning to be reduced to the condition of bond- 
men ; and a man so magnificent as was Horus in his archi- 
tectural plans would need such laborers in his constructions; if 
not for the outward embellishments, at least for the substan- 
tial parts of his edifices. The Israelites became bond-men 
and the bonds were rapidly tightened. They were made to 
labor ; were watched ; task-masters were put over them ; 
their state of bitter slavery under the narrow-minded despot 
and his jealous people soon became complete. The Egypt- 
ians quickly learnt to be masters : the Israelites quickly 
learnt that in a country where all power was in the despots, 
they must submit. It was a terrible change from their first 
state in Goshen ; but they were without organization for 
resistance, friendless and helpless as regarded all human 
means. 

Horus, after a reign of thirty-two years, according to 
Bunsen's computation, was succeeded by Ramesses L, whose 
occupancy of the throne lasted but nine years ; and who, 
on his death, left the kingdom to his son, Sethos I. If the 
same chronology be correct, we have in this last monarch a 
very remarkable personage as respects the Israelites; for 
although his reign continued only twelve years, not only 
was he a conqueror of adjacent nations, and the creator of 
many of the most magnificent palaces and halls to be seen 
in Egypt, but his were also the most determined and cruel 



FROM JOSEPH TO MOSES. 



253 




] 



SETHOS I. (Seti. Ra-men-Ma. t.) Thought to be the Pharaoh in whose time Moses 

was born, 
{Copied by careful tracing from Lepsiits' hook.) 

22 



254 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

of all the efforts to check the growth of the Hebrew race. 
He seems to have been a man of intense energies; and in 
whatever line they were occupied, to have carried his pur- 
poses to extremes, regardless of everything but the accom- 
plishment of his plans. 

It was he who issued orders to the Egyptian women, 
whose employments gave them facilities for such acts, to de- 
stroy all the Hebrew male children at their birth. The 
Israelites had gone on increasing rapidly in number, not- 
withstanding the hardships which had been accumulating 
upon them ; for ^^the more they were afflicted the more they 
multiplied and grew.'^ The indigenous population of the 
country scarcely needed any stimulants to the exercise of 
oppression over a helpless people, who by forced service 
were contributing so largely to their advantage, and the 
" Egyptians,'^ we are told, " made the children of Israel to 
serve with rigor. And they made their lives bitter with 
hard bondage, in mortar, and in brick, and in all manner 
of service in the field : all their service wherein they made 
them serve was with rigor.^^ 

The monarch thought that if the Israelitish males could 
be gradually exterminated, then a new people might be 
raised up from Egyptian husbands, which Avould have the 
desirable characteristics of the stranger race, combined with 
Egyptian nationality. Therefore orders were given to those 
Egyptian women whose peculiar occupation afforded oppor- 
tunities for such barbarity, to destroy every Israelite male 
child at its birth. But the hearts of these women showed 
the tenderness belonging to their sex, and the order was not 
obeyed, a false reason being invented by them for not com- 
plying with the royal decree. Then another mandate fol- 
lowed still more cruel ; for, while in the former case the 
child might have been reported to the mother as never 
having lived, in the latter, the infant, after having been 
taken to her arms must, if a male, be snatched thence and 



FROM JOSEPH TO MOSES, 255 

thrown into the JSTile. The Egyptian Nile-gods, the croco- 
diles, would have their feast on the suspected and hated 
race. 

A sentiment of shuddering horror spread through the 
entire Hebrew people, and reached also the hearts of many 
of the Egyptians themselves. Yet, the latter argued, it was 
the only way of saving their own nation from destruction, 
for these strangers were multiplying to such a degree as to 
have become truly formidable on account of their numbers. 
The issue had been made with them by changing their state 
from that of subject to slave ; enmity had been implanted in 
them, and it would be easy for them to combine with out- 
side nations and assist in an invasion, or even perhaps to 
rise, and by their own numbers of hardy, active, ^rong 
people, without foreign aid to overwhelm the less vigorous 
race. They were a nation quite distinct, although in the 
heart of Egypt, — for as slaves they had now been carried 
to every part of the country ; they were keeping themselves 
carefully and strictly a separate race, repelling all efforts at 
assimilation with the natives ; they avoided Egyptian tem- 
ples, and treated with opprobrious names both the Egyp- 
tian worship and the gods. It seemed to be a demand from 
the gods, as a duty, to extirpate such a people as far as they 
could be spared, or to blend them with the indigenous pop- 
ulation : the safety of the nation at all events called for de- 
cisive measures. So the cruel mandate was sent forth, and 
a wild and dark horror took possession of all the Israelite 
people. But this second order was also evaded by the more 
merciful Egyptian female attendants whenever it could be 
done. 

One day, a daughter of the monarch, coming dow^n with 
her maidens to the river, saw in the water near the bank 
a cradle of rushes,^ and in it a three months^ old child, 

1 The papyrus was thought by the Egyptians to be a protection from 
the crocodile. 



256 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

already remarkable for its beauty.^ She knew at once the 
meaning of the sight before her. -The little ark was made 
skilfully, with such care as only a mother's fingers could 
supply ; and was rendered water-tight by means of lime and 
pitch. It was a male child, one of those doomed to death, 
and perhaps put there as an appeal to her tenderness. The 
sympathies of the daughter of the king were aroused. All 
the terrible cruelty of that universal mandate flashed before 
her, as she saw the beautiful infant with those proofs about 
it of a mother's love and tender care, and even perhaps of 
hope — if hope might be in such a kingdom, where murder- 
ous barbarity ruled. The child was weeping as she bent 
over it, uttering its little cries for food and its unconscious 
appeals to her for life. She determined to skve it. 

The babe had not been unwatched. If its mother had 
come, her own life might also easily have been the forfeit ; 
but its sister, Miriam, was within watching distance, and 
keeping earnest scrutiny of all that was occurring. When 
she saw pity in the face of the king's daughter and the 
attendants, she immediately made her appearance ; and as 
the sympathy and resolution of the princess became decided, 
she ventured on a bold offer, " Shall I go, and call to thee a 
nurse of the Hebrew women, that she may nurse the child 
for thee ?" and permission was given. 

The mother, at home, was listening for sounds. Nervous; 
faint amid the convulsions of hope and fear within her ; her 
mixed thoughts, now on God, now on the tyrant, and again 
hovering about her child, had no resting-place, but whirled 
in her brain. Suddenly she heard the sound of footsteps, 
and knew them to be her daughter's. What was it? She 
had not time to ask, and perhaps through extreme agitation 
could not have asked ; but there was no need. The very 
elasticity of step told good news : the joyful face and eyes 
told more : — the words were even beyond all highest hopes ! 

^ See Acts vii. 20. 



FROM JOSEPH TO MOSES. 257 

The mother hurried to the palace, and had her boy again 
in her arms, though probably the caution engendered by 
danger kept her from showing that it was her own. She 
received the order, '' Take this child away and nurse it for 
me and I will give thee thy wages ;^^ and she took it off: 
and then she gave full vent to the mother's joy and love, 
and also of gratitude to Jehovah. Could she, after this, 
fail to trust Him for all that might yet come in this child's 
life? 

The child thrived and grew ; — grew under such care and 
love, and such prayers as the prospect of approaching dan- 
gers to it could produce only in a mother's heart : for he 
was soon — so very soon, it seemed to her — to be delivered 
back to the princess and to the perils of a life which was to 
be blended w^ith the corruptions of that court of cruel men. 
Her faith in God was strong ; but still the mother's fears 
came sweeping back and forth through her heart in spite of 
that faith. He would, she was aware, grow up an alien 
even to her. He would hear his race stigmatized, and see 
the paintings where they were represented in unseemly and 
disgusting shapes. He would witness the current of jealousy 
and hatred that was directed as if to sweep the race from 
the earth. He would be a favored prince among those gor- 
geous halls, where pride would so readily spring up in any 
heart and rule permanently there, adapted to make him 
despise all beneath him, even perhaps his mother. He would 
dwell among those sculptured representations of their gods, 
which we know, even now draw out enthusiasm in our en- 
lightened times; and where the priests in those temples 
were the most honored of all people in the land. He would 
perhaps himself be made a priest, as indeed, the adopted 
son of the princess would be expected to be. He might 
forget — indeed, in such circumstances how could he, she 
feared, fail to forget — the God of his forefathers, who would 
then, in return, leave him to himself and to the barbarous 
22* 



258 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

court and to just retributions. His own mother — how could 
he be kept to know her ? — or would he wish to know her ? — 
he, the adopted, cherished son of Pharaoh^s daughter. So 
his mother held him to her heart, as if she would never let 
him go. She had another son, Aaron, three years older, 
born perhaps before the edict; and also the daughter, 
Miriam : but for them^ amid the debasements of their 
race and the gloom, there were no dangers in any respect 
comparable to those which awaited this child in the coming 
glory of his prosperity. And yet — so full of contradictions 
is our nature — amid such doubts and fears and shrinking, 
her own vanity and pride were fed by the prospective glory 
of her boy, though the glory would be so perilous. 

She kept him, in her fond love, as long as she dared ; 
and then had to give him up to Pharaoh's daughter, " and 
he became her son.'^ He was called by the princess 3Io-uses, 
from two Egyptian words — Mo, " w^ater,'^ and uses, " saved 
from water,'' ^ a perpetual remembrancer to him of his 
escape from perishing and of his indebtedness to her. 

In the mean while, Sethos I., if we are correct in our 
chronology, was bringing that intensity of purpose which 
appears to have been his characteristic, into full action in all 
the events of his reign. His architectural constructions 
have been the wonder of all succeeding times, and on them 
he has left recorded his victories and triumphs, among which 
is his conquest of " the Shasu" {i. e., shepherds) " in the 
hostile land of Canaana," — for so the inscription reads. Ac- 
cording to the same record, this was in the first year of his 
reign ; and his warlike struggles there may have given force 
to his jealous fears respecting the Hebrew shepherd-race, so 
dangerously, he thought, intruded into Egypt. Bunsen 
says resi)ecting the hieroglyphic records on these monu- 
ments: "Everything combines to render it probable that 



* See Jos., Antiq. ii. 9, ^ 6. 



FROM JOSEPH TO MOSES, 259 

the extent of the campaigns of the Tuthmoses and Rames- 
sides, as well as the names of the people which are in part 
frequently repeated^ were, as regards general history, a very 
narrow one. Wherever we discover an undoubted histori- 
cal Asiatic name,* it is in Palestine or Syria. Here we have 
Canaan and the Hittites, here also Damascus ; and as a 
general rule, the extreme northern point seems to be Meso- 
potamia. If then, we compare with this limited theatre of 
the campaigns and conquests of the Pharaohs of that age, 
the vast number of names which are recorded as individual 
peoples, it is clear, in the first place, that no great empire 
then existed in Palestine and Syria, not even an important 
state. The second result, and one which is a direct conse- 
quence of the other is, that these monuments represent the 
condition of those countries as precisely identical with what 

'. we find in the most ancient accounts in the Bible, — single 
Canaanitish races, principally nomads, and a few towns, 
some of which were fortified.^^ 

We have not room in a work like this to enter into de- 

\ scriptions of the palace of this monarch — '^ The house of 

; Sethos,^^ in Western Thebes, or of his buildings across the 
river at Luxor, or of the gorgeous and important representa- 
tions pictured in his tomb : but we cannot refrain from pre- 
senting the hall of columns which he formed at Thebes, and 

; also taking notice of the temple to which this wonderful 
hall was but a part of the line of approach. In reading 
these things we remember that this gorgeousness of archi- 
tecture was one of the causes of the grinding hardships in 
the lives of the Israelites, who had, as slaves, to assist in 
erecting at least the massive walls which are faced by those 
grand sculptured forms; and we observe also that it was 
amid these halls and temples that Moses had his education 
and received his impressions of Egyptian religion^ indeed, 
where he was probably himself a priest. 

This hall was reached by passing between two grand and 



26o LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

lofty propylon towers at its front ; and when entered opened 
on the right and left of the spectator, to an extent altogether 
of three hundred and twenty-nine feet, with one hundred 
and seventy feet in his front : directly before him was the 
avenue here presented, consisting of twelve columns, each 




Avenue in the Great Hall of Columns at Karnak, Thebes. 

column twelve feet in diameter and sixty-six high, without 
including the base and capital, — with these, ninety feet in 
lieight. On the right and left wore two hundred and two 
other columns, each nine feet in diameter, and forty-one feet 
nine inches high, not including base and capital. All the 



FROM JOSEPH TO MOSES. 261 

central columns yet remain, and of the others one hundred 
and two are standing ; and says Lepsius, " It is impossible 
to describe the overwhelming impression which is experi- 
enced upon entering for the first time into this forest of 
columns and wandering from one range into another, 
between lofty figures of gods and kings on every side, rep- 
resented on them, projecting sometimes entirely, sometimes 
only in part. Every surface is covered with various sculp- 
tures, now in relief, now sunk, which were, however, only 
completed under the successors of the builder; most of them 
indeed by his son, Ramses Miamun/^ 

Advancing across this magnificent hall, we come next to 
another propylon or gateway, formed by two lofty towers ; 
then to where was another court, in which were two obe- 
lisks — one of them yet standing, the other prostrate ; then 
by another propylon, now in ruins, to another court, where 
stands an obelisk ninety-two feet high and eight feet square 
at its base, — its companion prostrate by its side ; next to 
other propylon towers ; then to another court ; then another 
court ; then a granite gateway ; and then another broad area 
which led to the holy place ; beyond which the ruins of 
sacred buildings extend to the eastward over a space even 
greater than that by which we have yet come. ^^AU these 
vast courts and areas, obelisks, towers and halls,^^ says a 
traveller, " are, or were, surrounded with columns, sphinxes 
and statues, and every stone is covered with carving and 
brilliantly painted. Not only was the temple colossal in its 
proportions, but it was gorgeous beyond all description in 
its furniture and adornments.^' The extent of the holy 
place, with its approaches, is estimated by Lepsius at two 
thousand feet. 

It may be well, in order to show the full magnificence of 
this Egyptian worship and its adornments, to add that the 
successor of Sethos I., in the time of Moses, placed before 
this hall of columns, and, as an entrance to it, another hall 



262 LIFE SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

two hundred and seventy-five by three hundred and thirty 
feet, with a corridor on each side and a double row of 
columns across the centre; and that this was approached 
from the river by a long avenue of sphinxes of colossal 
size, facing each other. Amenophis III., the Pharaoh im- 
mediately preceding Horus I., had also connected his palace 
at Luxor with the temple of Chunsu at Karnak, by a 
double row of beautifully sculptured colossal Ammon- 
sphinxes in sandstone (having the body of a lion and the 
head of a ram), this avenue being above a mile in length. 
Eosselini counted them for two hundred and forty paces, 
and found sixty on each side. This in a mile would make 
five hundred on each side. That sovereign seems to have 
constructed also at Thebes an avenue lined with colossal 
sitting statues of the lion or cat-headed goddess ; and the 
ground in this region is covered with fragments of sphinxes, 
on which the name of Amenophis may be read, some of 
them having a human face. There has never been a reli- 
gion in which such refinements of mysticisms have been 
combined with such a wonderful architectural impressive- 
ness as in that of Egypt. 



CHAPTER XXVII. 
MO-USES— ''SAVED FROM WATERS 

THE close of the last chapter will show the grandeur and 
gorgeousness of idolatrous worship, and the nature of 
the influences to which tlu* mother of Moses had to surren- 
der her cliild, when, in due time, he was sent for and taken 
to the palace by the daughter of the king. The mother 
gave him up with many tears, and doubtless also with many 



MO-USES— '' SAVED FROM WATERS 



263 



prayers ; and then retired to her lowly home with corroding 
apprehensions that he was probably lost to her and to God. 
He was adopted as a son by the princess, Thermuthis by 
name/ and was installed into the luxuries of the Egyptian 
court amid its marble halls, its gorgeous draperies, its sculp- 
tured gods, and the servility and flattery of its attending 
servants, all of whom were of the nobles of the land. It 
was indeed a place adapted to enchant and win the heart of 
the Hebrew boy. In costume and manners he soon could 
not be distinguished from the Egyptians themselves. 





Lock of hair worn by Head-dress of an Egyptian 

Egyptian children. prince. 

{From WilJdnson's Ancient Egyptians.) 

According to our computation, Moses was born about the 
[fourth year of the reign of Sethos I. ; and at the death of 
t that monarch he was about eight years of age. The successor 
Ion the throne was Ramesses II., surnamed '^the Great,^' 
twhose rule of sixty-six years is considered the most splendid 
[in the Egyptian annals, although it was the most oppressive 
of all to his subjects, and was especially so to the Hebrews. 
But the Hebrew child in the palace had little conscious- 
[ness of changes without, sheltered as he was, and petted by 
the princess and attendants, and under such sunshine of 
royal favor unfolding constantly in additional beauty and 
strength. The new monarch soon entered upon a brilliant 
career of foreign conquests ; and then after his return, com- 
menced those architectural designs which have filled all 



^ Josephus, II. 9, 5. 



LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT, 

Egypt with splendid halls and temples ; the enslaved Israel- 
ites meanwhile sinking lower and lower in degradation, and 
groaning in the abjectness of utmost misery ; and the royal 
proteg^, Mo-uses, the " saved from water,'^ every day be- 
coming more a favorite, as he grew into being a bright, 
happy lad, making the home of his foster-mother lively 
through his enjoyment of his young life. Soon, however, as 
he grew older, he commenced taking cognizance of the reali- 
ties around him ; and then the iron began to enter into his 
soul. People and events were assuming their true character 
before him : doubts, disgusts, horror swept in succession 
through him, and at last he felt that such a life as his was a 
mockery and a disgrace. All this came upon him by de- 
grees, but yet fearful was the awaking from his child-dream; 
for the heart at that age is more keenly sensitive than after- 
ward, when we learn to harden or control our natures. 

During this time the boy, and then as he grew, the man, 
was initiated into the Egyptian learning, of which he finally 
gained the complete mastery ;' and in this at least had some- 
thing to drive away bitter thoughts. 

The Egyptian learning was vast, and very often pro- 
found. We have a notice of their forty-two Hermetic 
books, described to us by Clemens Alexandrinus from gen- 
uine ancient authority ; and we learn that of these, ten 
treated of the laws and the gods, namely, of the highest theo- 
logical education, which embraced at once divine and human 
laws and philosophy ; ten were lihirc/ical, about sacrifices, 
hymns, prayers, j^rocessions, feasts &c. ; fourteen were on 
the exact sciences, which were also indispensable to the 
priests. Of these fourteen, ten embraced the science of 
writing and drawing, and also all that fell within the de- 
partment of the measurement of space and of geometry, 
commencing with cosmography , universal geography^ the 



* See Acts vii. 20. 



MO-USES— '' SAVED FROM WATER:' 265 

chorograTpliy of Egypt^ and also the topography of the tem- 
ple sites, and lastly the arrangements of the furniture of 
the temple. The other four, the astrological, more properly 
called by us the astronomical, were committed to a particu- 
lar class of scholars, the horoscopi, or time-seers. This 
portion entered into everything that was necessary to be 
acquainted with for the calculation of time, especially the 
stars, the arrangement of the planets, the conjunctions and 
phases of the sun and moon, and lastly the rising of the 
stars. 

Then came two books of the chanter, that is the precentor, 
a practical leader of the religious and festive songs. His 
two books contained hymns to the gods and observations on 
the royal life, as a subject-matter of religious charms. The 
last six books were on medicine.^ 

Asb^onomy was cultivated in the most elaborate and com- 
plete manner. " We have discovered/' says Lepsius, " a 
division of time less than the hour to the sixty times six- 
tieth part of a minute ; and above an hour to a period of 
36,525 years. Between these there were the greatest variety 
of cycles, such as no other ancient nation, except the Egyp- 
tians, have been able to produce in equal perfection 

They recognized as forms of years, and carried out in a 
calendar both the oldest lunar year, as well as the solar 
year of 365 days, and the Sirius year, which was one fourth 
of a day longer. The civil solar year, after twenty-five 
years, namely at the Apis period, agreed again with the 
lunar year; in the same way, calculating by the day, it 
agreed with the Sirius year at a lustrum of four years ; and 
in the space of 1461 years it agreed completely with the 
Sothis period. The Phoenix period of 1500 years was em- 
ployed to make the civil year agree with the tropical year. 
Finally the Sidereal year, or the slow receding of the eclip- 



^ Extracted from Lepsius. 
23 



266 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

tic to the west, became known, and it was expressed, 
although with an imperfect comprehension of the direction 
and the velocity of the movement, by its greatest astronom- 
ical period of 36,525 years/^ 

Such were the studies cultivated by an Egyptian scholar ; 
and we watch this student of their sciences, Mo-uses, as 
through long weary days he worked his way more and more 
deeply into the national lore, his mind oppressed unceasingly 
with the sufferings of his countrymen. The full extent of the 
learning of the country was known only to their priests, 
and the fact that Moses became a complete adept in it seems 
scarcely to leave a doubt of the correctness of the opinion 
held by a great many that he was himself enrolled in the 
priesthood at their sacred city of On. Strabo, who probably 
took his account of him from Hecatseus, speaks of him as 
an Egyptian priest ; and so does Manetho, who informs us 
that his name is said to have been also Osarsiph, from Osi- 
ris, "who was the god of Heliopolis/^^ As an adopted son 
of Pharaoh's daughter, he would, according to Egyptian 
usages, be thus enrolled and thus educated : and the ordi- 
nances which afterward came from him for the Israelites 
when in Arabia show an intimate acquaintance with the 
Egyptian hierarchy. 

We turn to gaze at him then in this anomalous and most 
uncomfortable position, against which all his feelings had 
gradually risen into rebellion, and in which the favors he 
received were grating harshly upon him, as he saw his 
countrymen ground into the dust by the tyranny of the 
Egyptian monarch, who was sustained in this by the jeal- 
ousy and fears of the Egyptian people respecting his race. 
He had come to recognize himself fully as an Israelite; and 
although his fetters were of gold, he felt himself still to be 
a slave among enslaved people, who were now receiving all 



' Jo.s. Cor. A p. T. ? 20. 



MO'USES—'' SAVED FROM WATER:' 267 

his sympathies. He looked round at the sculptured figures 
of gods in these magnificent halls and temples, and at Apis 
and Mnevis, the supposed incarnations of their deities ; and 
amid his honors, which his heart felt now to be degradation, 
he turned in humility to seek after the God whom his fore- 
fathers worshipped, and respecting whom in his now culti- 
vated intercourse with his own people he more frequently 
heard. Jehovah, even to the Israelites in their debasement 
and ignorance, was a dimmed vision, but was still adhered 
to as the God of Abraham and Isaac and Jacob ; and now, 
though seemingly forsaking them, was still the centre of 
hopes faint but not quite yielded up — their only hope. 

During this condition of Moses and the Israelites, the 
monarch Ramesses II., mis-called " The Great,^^ was exer- 
cising a despotism which has not had a parallel in that 
country. After his successful wars, during which he had 
sculptures cut on the rocks near what is now Beyrout repre- 
senting his conquests and where the figures remain to this 
day, he engaged in architectural projects so grand and 
wide that all Egypt is still covered with the wonderful 
results. Among these are rock-temples, all the walls of 
which are faced with splendid bassi-relievi, the statues as 
large as life ; also splendid palaces and sphinx-avenues, and 
propylons and columnar-avenues at Thebes, and colossal 
statues of himself, one of them at Memphis thirty-four 
feet and a half in height, and one, a sitting one, at Thebes, 
forty feet from the seat, — so large that the foot measures 
eleven feet in length. One of his statues is part of a 
group in which he is represented as the god Ra, sitting be- 
tween the gods Ammon and Muth, and giving life and 
purity to the king, that is to himself. One of his obelisks 
is now in the Place de Concoi^de at Paris. Many of these 
Egyptian sculptures are in granite, so hard that the hardest 
steel makes little impression on it, and yet the figures are 
cut with a sharpness of angle and outline that always excites 



268 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT 

the wonder of the beholder. A beneficent work of this 
monarch was his canal made from the most eastern arm of 
the Nile, commencing at Pithom and ending at Ramesses, 
where he had built two '^ treasure-cities/' noticed in Ex. i*^H 
11 ; Ramesses was also the starting-place of the Israelites i" 
(Ex. xii. 37), in the Exodus. There has lately been dis- 
covered on its site a monument containing three figures cut 
in a block of granite, one of them Ramesses II., between 
the gods Ra and Tum, and having the cartouches of Ra- 
messes cut on it six times. 

It will be seen that the reign of such a sovereign-projector 
must have been terribly oppressive to all his subjects, and 
especially so to the enslaved Israelites. We give here a 
copy of his face taken from the monuments, and the reader 
will notice the expression, showing a nature cold, decided, 
self-satisfied, dark and secret. " Who is the colossal figure,^^ 
says Stanley, in writing about this monarch, " that sits re- 
peated, again and again, at the entrance of every temple? 
who is it that rides in his chariot, leading diminutive na- 
tions captive behind him ? To whom is it that in the 
frontispiece of every gateway the gods give the falchion of 
destruction, with the command to 'slay and slay and slay'? 
whose sculptured image, in the interior of the temples, is it 
that we see brought into the most familiar relations with the 
highest ])owers, equal in form and majesty, suckled by the 
greatest goddess, fondled by the greatest god, sitting beside 
tliem, arm entwined in arm, in the recess of the most holy 
place ? . . . . We see his profound yet scornful repose 
expressed both in countenance and attitude ; we see the long 
profile, majestic and beautiful beyond any of his successors 
or prede(!essors. We see even the peculiar curl of his nos- 
trils and the fall of his under lip.'' 

Such was the Pharaoh in the palace, while Moses was grow- 
ing into manhood, and was then advancing onward, getting 
mature in years and clear in his observations of rulers and 



MO-USES'-" SAVED FROM WATER: 



369 






orrC/^r?/s>,y.^ &^(^>PM 








RAMESSES 1 1. (Ramessu. Ra-usv-Ma. t). Supposed to be the Pharaoh in whose reign 
Moses fled from Egypt. 
(Copied by careful tracing from Lepsiu^ work.) 
23 * 



270 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

people, and was also pursuing his studies doubtless among 
the priests. All humanity in him revolted against the stern, 
proud, inhuman despot, and against the minions and officers 
of the government down through every grade and through 
the hordes of taskmasters grinding the Israelites and tread- 
ing this whole population into the dust. Strangely, these 
people were still multiplying rapidly; their hard labor 
seeming to give robustness to their constitutions notwith- 
standing their abasement. But this abasement, and the 
habits arising from their filthy and crowded habitations, 
had brought among them a frightful disease, the leprosy, 
unknown among them before. 

Moses had, during these studies and observations, got to 
be forty years of age. He was an utterly lonely man amid 
those crowds of priests and courtiers. He had not married, 
for there was no sympathy between him and these oppres- 
sors, and he desired no bonds with them : his thoughts, 
brooding over his people's wrongs, turned into resentment 
and quickness of passion : he often left his studies to wander 
abroad and probe the depth of the degradation and suffer- 
ings of his people. One day, while thus abroad, he saw an 
Egyptian beating an Israelite : — HE slew the Egyptian. 

He had taken the precaution even amid this burst of 
wrath, to see that he was unwatched, and he buried the 
body hastily in the sand. But the man whom he had 
rescued seems not to have kept the secret ; and very soon 
the offender a":ainst the stern laws of the king-dom became 
aware that it was known to others. Passing along, he saw 
two of his own people contending, one of them clearly in 
the wrong. He reproved the latter ; and the wrong-doer, 
as is aj)t to be the case in such interferences, turned his rage 
from his opi)onent upon the reprover. More than that, the 
base man was ingrate enougjj to cast against him his previ- 
ous act: "Who made thee a prince and a judge over us? 
intendest thou to kill me, as thou killedst the Egyptian?'' 



MOSES IN MID IAN. 271 

There could be no hope of concealment now. Indeed it 
soon became evident that the whole matter was known in 
the royal palace ; it was a deadly offence in the eyes of the 
government. No interest or entreaties by the princess, if 
she were still living, could save him, and probably he had 
few or no friends at court. The high position of the offen- 
der made the offence the more noticeable. The government 
knew that those numerous subjects might in their despera- 
tion be easily induced to a revolt : here was the bold, quick 
man to unite and lead them : he must be summarily and 
speedily dealt with. Moses became aware, in season, of 
Pharaoh^s intent on his life : so he fled hastily from the 
palace, in the direction of Arabia. 



CHAPTER XXVIII. 
MOSES IN MIDIAN. 



THE refugee little thought, as he hurried on his way, 
avoiding frequented places, and seeking the most retired 
spots, and ever glancing behind to see whether or not he 
was pursued, — that one day he would come along in the 
same direction at the head of the whole Jewish people de- 
livered by the arm of God himself! 

God only could deliver them, so thoroughly broken 
down and so abject-spirited had they become. But, if a 
thought of such possible deliverance could now have entered 
the mind of the refugee, he might well query whether God 
would see fit to interfere ; for the Jewish people had by this 
time almost forgotten even the very name of Jehovah.* 
Even Moses himself had received but little instruction 



* Inference from Ex. iii. 13. 



272 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

of that kind : how could he receive any ? His education 
had been altogether Egyptian. The Hebrews had little, if 
any, literature; their traditions could come to him in the 
royal palace or in the temples at On, only in faint sounds, and 
would be treated with contempt by all about him; and the 
debased condition of his people was adapted to bring into 
disrespect any opinions of the Deity held by them. 

So, as this man, flying from pursuers, took his way 
toward Arabia, it was with confused notions on all religious 
topics, and with many doubts mingling with the gloom of 
his refugee-life. We must here again remind the reader 
that in those days literature, except such as existed among 
the Egyptians, was extremely scant, and the Egyptian in- 
struction would, of course, be altogether on the side of their 
false gods. The Israelites had their traditionary knowledge, 
but even this, in the course of their slavery, must have 
become fainter every year. There was nothing to revive it ; 
only one dull, heavy, crushing servitude, in which the God 
of their ancestors seemed to have utterly forsaken them; 
while on the side of their superiors was idolatry seemingly 
blessing its followers with abundance and ease. Who was 
there, or what was there, to enlighten them, during this 
long slavery in which they were sinking every day into 
lower and lower abasement, with no time for instruction in 
their own religion if they had desired it, and no books ; — 
only a sottish, grovelling ignorance deepening constantly 
among them? As to Moses, he had been debarred in a 
great degree even from that traditionary knowledge which 
common suffering would lead his people in some degree to 
cherish, or which might have some stimulus to its indi- 
viduality through the taunts of their oppressors. But still, 
he was not quite ignorant in these important matters of his 
people's distinctive belief. Something he had ])icked up by 
various means, — probably carried to him by his mother's 
unceasing watchfulness for opportunities ; something in con- 



I 



MOSES lA^ MIDIAN, 273 

nection with such enlightenment, was suggested to him by 
his own reasonings concerning the Egyptian idolatry ; and 
all was strengthened by his sympathy for his people and 
indignation against the oppressors. His own intellect was 
of the most powerful order; and though only catching 
glimpses of the truth, it was able, by those glimpses, to 
establish a sufficiency of faith to serve for action. But dur- 
ing those years of study and observation and reasoning, and 
of shaking himself loose from the shackles of priestly 
education, and of combatting with himself, when all 
interest drew him perceptibly to one side and conviction was 
pointing to the opposite ; — those years of despair respecting 
his countrymen so abject in mind as well as in body ; — years 
of rebellion in his heart against the court and courtiers, 
his constant associates ; — years of contempt for himself 
because enduring and seemingly encouraging the falsities 
around him, and of apparent hopelessness in any resistance ; 
and also of knowing certainly that want and slavery, or 
more likely a felon's death would follow his abjuring what 
he was learning every day more and more to despise and 
hate and also to fear ; — during all those years what a life 
his had been in the palace or at On ! 

He was now aw^ay from it ; and although feeling himself 
to be a fugitive, still as he fled on toward the Red Sea, and 
j then beyond it farther into Arabia, his step was more elastic 
and his eye brighter and his manner more in the true dignity 
of his manhood, then had been the case for a long time 
before. Here, at least, he was leading no false life. Here 
he was independent and could be true to himself and to what 
he knew, or might know, of God. Around him also was 
nature in great, majestic forms, often desolate it was true, 
and in that desolateness akin to his own feelings, but akin 
also to sentiments of elevation and force that he felt were in 
himself. Indeed Egypt had, for some time, palled upon 
him ; for there was a monotony and an oppressive character 



274 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

even in its grandeur, so ruled by law and by the despotic 
power. — Here all was free ! 

With such feelings he had sat down, after penetrating 
some distance into Arabia, to refresh himself by a well, and 
to rest; and while there, seven women came with their 
flocks in order to water them, — for the refugee was now 
among people leading the primitive life of which he had 
heard as that of his ancestors. The life about him was 
simple enough ; — flocks, the daughters even of the prince or 
sheikh attending them, tents moving hither and thither, no 
temples or halls of the Osirides, but great mountains with 
God's own image impressed upon them : — and freedom 
everywhere. 

Yet even here was violence ; for after the women had 
drawn water and filled the troughs for their flocks, some 
men came for a similar purpose, and drove them away. The 
Egyptian (as he seemed to be) sprang to the help of the 
women. His gloomy thoughts along the way about vio- 
lence to the weak and helpless left behind made him addi- 
tionally intolerant of violence here, and the stranger shep- 
herds were made to recoil from his indignation and from 
the strength that in Egypt had been able to kill an 
oppressor : he helped the women, and direw more water for 
their flocks. 

They were the daughters of Reuel (or Jethro), a sheikh 
of the country, a Midianite. The reader will remember 
that this race of people were the descendants of Abraham 
by his last wife Keturah. The family had multiplied, and 
had scattered over the country, doubtless intermarrying 
with Abraham's descendants through Ishmael, who were 
also inhabitants of Arabia. Sometimes they spread north- 
wardly east of the Dead Sea, and on occasions engaged in 
commerce ; but the shepherd life was better suited to their 
habits and inclinations, as it is to the inclinations of their 
descendants at this day. 



MOSES IN MIDIAN, 275 

When these daughters of the sheikh returned to their 
father's tents, in answer to the father's inquiries about their 
coming so early they detailed the events at the well, and the 
refugee was immediately sent for, and introduced to the hos- 
pitalities of this home. 

More than that, in due time he obtained there a wife; 
for Jethro was so pleased with him that he gave him Zip- 
porah, his daughter, as an inducement to stay and to make 
his residence among the tribe. 

He remained there forty years. His wife gave him two 
sons, of whom the elder was named Gershom, " Expulsion," 
(from Garash, to ch^ive out), and the other JEIiezer, meaning 
^^ God is my helper :" and thus, in the cares and enjoyments 
of domestic life and the service of his father-in-law as keeper 
of his flocks, time passed tranquilly away to him, through 
successive years, amid those mountains and valleys, the 
open wastes and fertile spots around the fountains in 
Arabia. 

The country where he was now is usually called " The 
Peninsula of Sinai,"^ not a correct term, for it is a triangle, 
the full northern side of which is joined to the desert region 
lying between Palestine and Egypt. A distinct name, how- 
ever, is needed for this remarkable region, and this will an- 
swer very well if it is thus understood. The country spoken 
of lies between the two northern arms of the Ped Sea, — the 
Gulf of Suez and the Gulf of Akabah — and has at the 
southern end of this triangle a collection of granite moun- 
tains, not arranged in any regularity of form, but each one 
distinct, with deep and mostly narrow valleys between their 
bare, black, precipitous sides ; both mountain and valley 
now offering but rarely a speck of verdure to the eye. All 
is bleak and desolate, but the necessities of the present in- 
habitants lead them to cut down the trees for making char- 



^ The reader will do well to refer to the map on page, 316. 



276 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

coal, almost the only thing they can procure for sale or 
barter ; and it is probable that, in the time of Moses, there 
was more verdure than at the present. But it must always 
have been a bleak, desolate and solitary region, quite apart 
from the rest of the world. Just north of this granitic 
portion, which is a triangle of about seventy miles on each 
side, is a more open belt of sandstone country, twenty-four 
miles wide ; and beyond this northwardly is limestone 
underlying, or else forming bare hills, in the great desert 
region extending on to Beersheba. But all these geological 
formations are now generally bare and barren alike. One 
spot must be excepted, and this one is so beautiful that, on 
account both of its own loveliness and of the contrast which 
it oflfers to the rest, it is called " the gem of the desert.'^ It 
is in a valley called the Wady Feiran, lying at the north- 
western edge of the granite region ; and there, quite excep- 
tionally to all else, is a stream of pure water, with trees 
overhanging it, and turf by its side, and some cultivation, 
where the Arabs raise grain, melons and figs. The whole 
place seems to have been considered a sacred one from the 
earliest times; for by the stream are remains of ancient 
churches, and in the adjoining bluffs have been excavated 
cells for anchorites, — the spaces scarcely large enough to 
contain a human body ; and all this region, even to the 
highest summits of the adjacent Mount Serbal, is sprinkled 
thickly over with singular inscriptions, which for a long 
time baffled every effort to decipher them. They are in 
letters rude, but evidently having a meaning, and in an un- 
known language : sometimes, however, Greek characters are 
intermingled, and a few have the Christian emblem of the 
cross; but these latter and the Greek are thought to be more 
modern than the others. For some time the earlier inscrip- 
tions were attributed to the Hebrews in their forty years' 
journeyings ; but Professor Beer, of Leipsic, who has lately 
succeeded in deciphering them, makes them out to be by the 



MOSES IN MIDIAN. 277 

Nabatheans of Petra and its neighborhood, of whom they 
are the only existing traces. He supposes them to have 
been made by pilgrims ; but Lepsius thinks that they were 
made by a Christian pastoral people. They are supposed to 
belong to the century preceding and that following the 
Christian era. This spot is very abundant in them, while 
they diminish in number as we recede from it. 

The neighboring Mount Serbal, three miles distant from 
Feiran, and reached by a branch wady, is one of the high- 
est mountains in the peninsula ; and standing quite discon- 
nected from the others, is the most imposing of all. It has 
an elevation of six thousand three hundred and forty-two 
French feet, with both summit and sides extremely rugged, 
the former compared by Dr. Olin to a series of stalactites 
turned lower end upward. The Arabs still climb its peaks, 
in order to offer sacrifices there on extraordinary occasions ; 
and the sanctity still attached by them to this mountain, as 
well as the marks of great regard in ancient times, and the 
beauty of the neighboring ^^gem of the desert,^^ together 
with its great convenience for a stopping-place for the 
Israelites, have made Lepsius and others consider this as 
the genuine Mount Sinai ; a subject which will be discussed 
in another part of this work. The whole of this region will 
require from us a more minute attention when we come to 
the journey of the Israelites through it and the delivery in 
it of the Law ; but it is desirable to have some acquaintance 
now with the country in which Moses was to spend so many 
years, and where, in order to be prepared to do so much 
good thereafter to others, he had first to do a great work 
within himself. 

We must never forget " the human element" in the in- 
spired men of ancient times, even in those most favored of 
the Almighty. God did not take for his agents men of 
wooden formations in intellect or feelings, and contented to 
be of that character ; but men who, though belonging to our 

24 



278 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

humanity, were trying to learn to do for Him. Our Saviour 
gave the true philosophy of God as helper when he said, 
If any man will do his will he shall know} 

Moses was here, now, to undergo a long process of men- 
tal discipline, before he could be prepared lor the immense 
work to which he was to be called. Inspiration would 
come, but not to a man benighted and making no eflFort for 
light ; not to one sinking down in a stupor of idleness, but to 
one rousing himself up to the highest kind of thinking and 
praying, and hoping and loving, — all connected with God. 

There was, in the first place, very much for Moses to un- 
learn with respect to himself, as well as much to learn. He 
was only a man ; he had been brought up in Egyptian tem- 
ples, with Egyptian training, where to the bias exercised 
on his youthful mind by the kindness and love of his foster- 
mother, had been added the enchantments of architectural 
grandeur and the influence on a growing intellect by the 
grave, majestic Osirides, and the old legends respecting 
their gods. All this had entered deeply into his soul, 
and could now be thoroughly shaken off or corrected, not 
by a single effort, but only by long struggles with himself 
and with error, and by earnest clingings, as for his life, to 
truths as they came out of chaos and became evident to his 
mind and heart. He was to be self-trained by the severest 
mental and moral discipline — God all the while assisting 
him — before he could be fitted to train others, in mind and 
hoart.'^ 

These savage-looking mountains in their sternness and 
solitudes were favorable for such searchings after truth and 
struggles with self. No temples here except of God's own 
forming; no images, yet God everywhere ; no corruptions to 
the heart in this entire simplicity of life and in these calm 



■ John vii. 17. 

• We see a ptriking exhibition of similar struggles long afterward in 
Luther. 



MOSES IN MIDIAN. 279 

and simple employments. The Midianltlsh tribe coming 
from Abraham had retained in their pastoral life a know- 
ledge of God handed down from that patriarch, better than 
had been done by Jacobus descendants among the strange 
mixtures and degrading servitude in Egypt ; and Jethro was 
now able ^ to aid even this student so endowed with large 
capacities, in these present efforts to reach higher truths. 

A long time he had in these solitudes ; and a long time 
was required ; — much self-searching, much prejudice to be 
shaken oflF, much obstinacy of error to be overcome, much 
purity of soul to be obtained, in order to fit it for the truth ; 
and we may believe, also, much prayer and earnestness with 
God for help. For he surely needed help. He, this man, 
with all our human feelings clinging to him, was to rise 
from that overwhelming rubbish of Egyptian mythology, 
evermore crumbling back upon his mind as he tried to work 
upward toward the light; and was to get up, at last, to 
where he could see God in singleness of heart and truth of 
soul, and to know Jehovah as he is. What was to assist 
him in all this ? Books ? There were few or none. Rea- 
son ? Alone, it must fail. Whence have help ? Only 
from God ; and God would help only as he would try to 
help himself with struggles and in prayer. 

Eusebius and other eminent critics suppose that during 
this time he wrote the book of Genesis, but others assert 
that the inspiration necessary for it did not come to him 
till after the delivery of the Law in Sinai. Whatever may 
have been the time of such composition, it is certain that 
the style of his writings is the best and purest in the He- 
brew Scriptures, and shows a very highly cultivated taste. 
Hebrew scholars consider the Pentateuch as constituting 
the golden age of their literature. 

We leave him now in this retirement, while we go back 
and look once more at Egypt and the Pharaohs. 

* Inferred from incidents in Ex. xviii. 



28o LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT, 



CHAPTER XXIX. 

WHO AND WHAT WAS THE PHARAOH OF THE 
EXODUS? 

WE left Ramesses II. on the throne of Egypt ; but when 
Moses had been thirty-four years in Arabia, death put 
an end to the reign of this Pharaoh, so glorious in foreign 
conquests and in embellishments of his country, but so ter- 
ribly exacting to every one under his rule. To the Is- 
raelites, — used as slaves, — his government had been a 
crushing weight. 

When he died, every one in Egypt breathed more freely 
and hoped for a relief from burdens. We turn now to look 
at his son and successor Menephthah, — and to inquire con- 
cerning him ; for this monarch seems to be clearly sho\tn by 
the monuments and by history to be the Pharaoh of the 
Exodus. We may well take an interest in studying his 
characteristics, for they were peculiar, and they may very 
readily have helped to shape those strange events blended 
with the deliverance of the Israelites. In connection with 
this subject comes up also an interesting question. Do the 
Egyptian monuments afford us anything in illustration of 
the Exodus ? With reference to this subject we can scarcely 
expect much ; for these monuments were for the glorification 
of the country or kings ; and this is an event of quite the 
reverse character ; but we may perhaps learn something, if 
not from what they say, then from their silence. 

We have seen how these monuments were accumulated in 
the time of Ramesses II. ; and also how, through the 
previous reigns, similar architectural structures were erected 
by the successive sovereigns as ornaments of Egypt and as 
records of their own great renown. Their tombs also, 



WHO WAS THE PHARAOH OF THE EXODUS? 28 1 

which we have not had time to notice, were nearly as won- 
derful, being great subterranean excavations of halls and 
passages, in the highest style of embellishment and of glori- 
fication of the sovereign. 

We come to Menephthah's reign, and then there is a re- 
markable change, — a gap looking not quite as if such a sov- 
ereign had never existed, but as if, having commenced his 
reign, he had presently come to a sudden and disastrous end. 

The Exodus is supposed by both Lepsius and Bunsen to 
have occurred in this reign ; the latter dating it in the sixth 
year : and they inform us that the only year of this Pharaoh 
mentioned on the monuments is the second, and that strictly 
speaking no historical monument by him exists at all. 
There is a column (stele) at Silsilis, cut in the rock ; but it 
was one of his sons who dedicated it. The third of the 
small rock temples there met with (dedicated to Hathor, the 
Egyptian Venus) it is true was constructed by Menephthah, 
but this was in the first year of his reign. The subjects of 
the inscription on it are merely religious. There is no allu- 
sion to exploit, no term conveying the idea either of glory 
or of prowess. An inscription at Silsilis alludes to a build- 
ing being commenced, for which a quarry was opened, 
where his second regal year is mentioned. In all the rest 
of Egypt there is no trace of him except his escutcheon 
{cartouche), which was placed on the buildings of his father 
at Thebes, and then his tomb at Niban el Moluk. But 
even this tomb was not finished by either him or his son. ^ 

" It is true," as Bunsen remarks, " that this is merely a 
negative proof." But, to quote further from his book, ^' It 
must, however, be admitted that if in this countless mass of 
buildings, sculptures and other monuments which extend 
down to the sixty-second year of Ramses, a sudden gap is 



* These notices of the monuments are mostly compiled from Bunsen, 
his language being also frequently used. 

24* 



283 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

found, such silence would be eloquent testimony in behalf 
of some great calamity. 

" Now such is precisely the case. The only year of . 
Menephthah mentioned on the monuments is his second ;'' 
and then this writer goes on to speak of Rossellini^s ad- 
mission above, that there is no historical monument by 
this king. 

In the history of Egypt by the Egyptian priest, Manetho, 
already noticed in this w^ork, we have a much more explicit 
account of this sovereign. It is quoted literally in the 
writings of Josephus ; and for reasons which we have 
already given, the truthfulness of Josephus in the extracts 
can scarcely be doubted. Manetho, after noticing that 
Amenophis (Menephthah) desired to see the gods as Orus 
(Horus) one of his predecessors had done, says that he com- 
municated his desire to a friend who '' seemed to partake of 
the divine nature, both as to wisdom and knowledge of 
futurities.^^ He was informed by the latter that he might 
succeed in getting sight of them, if " he would clear the 
whole country of the lepers and of the other impure 
people,^^ and that he sent them to the quarries on the eastern 
side of the Nile. Afterward, however, he set apart for them 
the city Avaris ; and we will now quote from Manetho, 
through Josepluis : '' But when these men were gotten into 
it, and found the place fit for a revolt, they appointed them- 
selves a ruler out of the priests of Heliopolis, whose name 
was Osarsiph, and they took their oaths that they would be 
obedient to him in all tilings. He then, in the first place, 
made this law for them : That they should neither worship 
the Egyptian gods, nor should abstain from any one of 
those sacred animals which they have in the highest esteem, 
but kill and destroy them all ; that they should join them- 
selves to nobody but to those that were of their con- 
federacy." Manetho i)roceeds to say that they fortified 
themselves at Avaris, and ^^got other priests and those that 



WHO WAS THE PHARAOH OF THE EXODUS? 283 

were polluted with them/^ and also induced some of the 
shepherd-race formerly sent from the country now to come 
back, and join their confederacy : that Amenophis (Men- 
ephthah) '' was in great confusion/^ and '' assembled the 
multitude of the Egyptians^^ and took counsel, and had the 
sacred animals and images of the gods made secure and his 
son sent to a safe place; after which he marched '' with the 
rest of the Egyptians, being 300,000 of the most warlike 
of them, against the enemy. Yet did he not join battle with 
them ; but thinking that would be to fight against the 
gods, he returned back and came to Memphis, where he 
took Apis and the other sacred animals which he had sent to 
him, and presently marched into Ethiopia, together with his 
whole army and multitude of the Egyptians/^ He adds 
that the descendants of the Hyksos having joined the con- 
federacy at Avaris, the two ravaged the country and com- 
mitted many excesses and cruelties upon the inhabitants, 
and then says, " It was also reported that the priest who 
ordained their polity and laws was by birth of Heliopolis ; 
and his name Osarsiph from Osiris, who was the god of 
Heliopolis ; but that when he was gone over to these people 
his name was changed, and he was called Moses.^^^ 

There seems to be scarcely room for doubt that we have, 
in this Egyptian account, such a version as their priests, 
from whom Manetho drew his history, would give of the 
Exodus recorded in our Bible; the facts being accommodated 
by them to the prejudices of that country. 

The testimony of Strabo, although having no particular 
reference to Menephthah, may properly be introduced at 
this place. Strabo travelled extensively in Egypt, and 
doubtless had much intercourse with the Egyptian priests. 
He says, " Moses, an Egyptian priest, who possessed a con- 
siderable tract of Lower Egypt, unable longer to bear with 



' Con. Ap. i. I 26. 



284 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT, 

what existed there, departed thence to Syria, and with him 
went out many who honored the Divine Being [to dicov). 
For Moses maintained and taught that the Egyptians were not 
right in likening the nature of God to beasts and cattle, nor 
yet the Africans, nor even the Greeks, in fashioning their 
gods in the form of men. He held that this only was God, 
that which encompasses all of us, earth and sea, that which 
we call heaven, and the order of the world and the nature 
of things. Of these, who that had any sense would venture 
to invent an image like anything which exists among our- 
selves ? Far better to abandon all images and sculpture, 
all setting apart of sacred precincts and shrines, and to pay 
reverence without any image whatever. The course pre- 
scribed was, that those who have the gift of good divina- 
tions for themselves and others should compose themselves 
to sleep within a temple ; and those who live temperately 
and justly may expect to receive some good gift from God, 
those always and none besides.^^ Strabo, who lived about 
the beginning of our era, is supposed to have taken this 
account from Hecatseus (549 B. C), which is given with 
further and less accurate details in Diodorus, xi. 

From these materials, furnished by the monuments and 
the history by Egyptians, we seem then to have reason fully 
to conclude ; — that Menephthah, son and successor of the 
despotic Ramesses II., was the Pharaoh of the Exodus; — 
that the new sovereign was a very superstitious man, and 
perhaps with moral characteristics such as may be in- 
ferred from the fact that the only temple he commenced was 
to the Egyptian Venus ; and that he was weak in mind and 
vacillating in purpose : and we are struck by the fact, that 
if our chronology be correct, Horus, who first began to per- 
secute the Israelites, and Menephthah, in whose reign they 
were quite delivered, were by their extreme idolatrous 
superstitions affiliated, at the beginning and the end, each 



THE MISSION TO DELIVER, 285 

of them having a vain ambition to be a spectator of their 
gods. 

Such appears to have been the Pharaoh before whom 
Moses was now about to appear with the demand from Je- 
hovah to let his people go free. 



CHAPTER XXX. 
THE MISSION TO DELIVER. 

FROM the city of Thebes, five and a quarter miles by- 
three in extent, or Memphis, estimated to be yet larger; 
and from Avhat in the former may be called a city of mag- 
nificent temples, or from the hives of beings in the latter, 
where now the traveller walks over miles of disinterred 
mummy remains ;— from either was a long stride in human 
life to the rugged mountains and the solitudes of the deserts 
of Arabia ; and such a transit there had been in the life of 
Moses. 

In the region of such strong contrasts to the place of his 
bringing up, and in employments quite as strongly in con- 
trast to his former occupations, he had now spent forty 
years. But it was a time of great opportunity for him. He 
could learn here, and he was learning. He was learning 
about himself: what was far better, he was learning about 
God. Where could there have been a better place for him 
to shake off the superstitions of his Egyptian priestly 
education ; to break mental shackles ; to unlearn a vast deal 
as well as to learn ; to try to see God with clear and bright 
mental vision, and to draw near to him in faith ? This 
simple employment of the nomads did not pall upon him, 
who in his mental life had such variety of resources, and so 



286 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 



I 



much in his soul-life to do. His complete intellectual 
training in Egypt, and his vast stores of knowledge there 
accumulated, came to his assistance ; and now, when he had 
been chastened by trials and was here in the pure moral air 
of the shepherd race among these mountains, both came in 
to make him what he afterward showed himself to be, a 
strong thinker, and strong doer, in the right. 

We can see him in his family, acted upon by the genial 
influences of wife and children ; we can see him in the deep 
glens, or on the mountain sides or tops, feeling that he was 
alone with God, and finding the companionship ennobling 
to every faculty of his soul ; and then we can see him in the 
tribe-gatherings at the tents, listening to traditions handed 
down from of old, — such historic streams there kept clear, 
because unmingled with grosser things or with multitudinous 
complicated events. The Kenite tribe, and the Ishmaelites, 
and occasional visitors from Edom, — all simple nomads 
from Abraham's time down, — all of them descendants from 
him, — would have these traditions from their forefathers 
most carefully preserved, and would cherish them with that 
pride of genealogy which we still see in the Arab race. 

And we may well believe also that, here at the tents were 
often heard the bardic strains, as the Kenites sat in the 
evening in the light of the wonderfully bright moon of that 
region, or as the fire flashed upon eyes equally flashing and 
upon features indicating that the listeners were wrought up 
into a frenzy of excitement. 

We may ask, did Moses himself compose and chant at 
this place the sublime poetry of the book of Job ? for the 
poetry and the subject were both worthy of him and his 
remarkable abilities; and the subjects of the poem are be- 
lieved by conmientators to have been drawn from Idumea, 
a country adjoining the peninsula of Sinai on the north. 
Numerous modern critics, the erudite Jahn among them, 
unite with the ancient Talraudists and many of the Greek 



THE MISSION TO DELIVER. 287 

and Syrian Fathers in the belief that the Book of Job was 
written by Moses : and if so, it was doubtless at this period : 
for the total silence in it respecting the Exodus shows that 
it was composed previous to that event. It has all the indi- 
cations of a very early origin ; and the customs hinted at in 
narrating its incidents are just such as prevailed among the 
Arabs of that region where Moses was living. 

Forty years in this nomadic occupation had brought 
him to the intellectually well-matured age of eighty ; his 
body strong and wiry as we always see among the nomads; 
his heart in full harmony with the grandeur of God^s works 
all around him. — Then came to his life a quick and won- 
derful change ! 

In feeding his flocks, he had, on one occasion, got near 
to Mount Horeb in this peninsula : and there suddenly 
appeared before him a most astonishing sight ; — a bush on 
fire and yet not in the least consumed ! A form, as of an 
angel, appeared in the midst of the flame; and as Moses 
came near, he heard a voice, warning him to take oflF 
his sandals, ^^ for the place whereon thou standest is holy 
ground." ^ God himself was speaking now — 

" I am the God of thy father, the God of Abraham, the 
God of Isaac and the God of Jacob ; " and then, as the 
awe-struck man hid his face and bowed, afraid to gaze 
longer, the words continued, — 

" I have surely seen the affliction of my people which are 
in Egypt, and have heard their cry by reason of their task- 
masters ; for I know their sorrows ;'^ and then announced 
that the time for their deliverance and for their restoration 
to Canaan had come ; with the conclusion, " Come now, 
therefore, and I will send thee unto Pharaoh, that thou 

' Fire among the Eastern nations was considered to be an emblem of the 
Deity. All people there perform their worship barefooted. The ancient 
Greeks did the same, and one of the maxims of Pythagoras was said to be, 
" Offer sacrifices and worship with your shoes off." 



288 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

mayest bring forth my people, the children of Israel, out of 
Egypt/^ 

The amazed and frightened man drew back : the com- 
mand was astounding ! 

" Who am I," he said, " that I should go unto Pharaoh, 
and that I should bring forth the children of Israel out of 
Egypt T — The reply was — 

'^ Certainly I will be with thee,^^ with the assurance that 
at this very mountain those people should serve God. But 
Moses saw only confusion and doubts and difficulties in the 
minds of those debased, ignorant people, in whom the very 
idea of God had become dim. 

•^ Behold,^^ he said, " when I come unto the children of 
Israel, and shall say unto them. The God of your fathers 
hath sent me unto you ; and they shall say to me. What is 
his name ? what shall I say unto them f^ The answer was, 

" I AM THAT I AM. Thus shalt thou say unto the chil- 
dren of Israel, ' I am hath sent me unto you.'^^ 

He was charged to say to them, moreover, that the God 
of their fathers had sent him ; and to gather the elders of 
their people together and deliver a set message to them, with 
a promise from God of deliverance. Then he was to take 
the elders before the king and say to him, 

" The Lord God of the Hebrews hath met with us ; and 
now let us go (we beseech thee), three days' journey into the 
wilderness, that we may sacrifice to the Lord our God.'' 

The same voice added that the king of Egypt would 
resist; but after certain demonstrations before him, of God's 
power, would yield and let them go. They were also, in 
consideration of their long, unpaid servitude, to spoil the 
Egyptians at their departure. 

But Moses saw insuperable difficulties in his way. What 
proof could he give them that his commission was from God ? 
He was a man like themselves, and he would be demand- 
ing of them the widest stretch of faith ; they would not be- 



THE MISSION TO DELIVER, 289 

lieve, or even listen ; they would treat him as an impostor. 
There was reason in the objections as he urged them now. 
Then, demonstrations open to his own senses were made. 
He was bid to cast the ^^ rod^^ (probably his shepherd^s staff) 
in his hand on the ground. He did so : it became a serpent, 
and he fled before it. He was recalled and bid to seize it ; 
and on his doing so, it became again a rod. He was bid to 
put his hand into his bosom. He did so, and on taking it 
out, saw it all covered with the white scabs of leprosy, 
^^ leprous as snow.^^ Again, on being bid, he put it into his 
bosom, and on withdrawing it saw that it was healed, and 
was as it had previously been. These were proofs to him 
that a supernatural power was to be joined with him in this 
message, which was indeed in itself so utterly desperate ; 
and he was told that signs of convincing power would be 
manifested by himself before this people. 

But he was still overwhelmed by thoughts of this strange, 
wonderful commission, requiring so much from himself and 
from others : — from him, only a man, and not gifted, as he 
thought, with the necessary qualifications. In himself he 
felt no added endowments, even in this present Divine com- 
panionship. Doubt and distress and terror still had their 
hold upon him. 

^^ O my Lord,^' he said, ^^ I am not eloquent, neither here- 
tofore nor since thou hast spoken unto thy servant : but I 
am slow of speech, and of a slow tongue." The answer 
was — 

" Who hath made man's mouth ? or who maketh the 
dumb, or deaf, or the seeing, or the blind ? have not I, the 
Lord ? Now therefore go, audi I will be with thy mouth, 
and teach thee what thou shalt say.'' 

Surely it was sufficient ; and we are struck with God's 
forbearance, amid these long resistances, and with the pa- 
tient reasoning. But now patience had its end ; and God, 
letting the man's claim of weakness prevail, and with no 

25 



290 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT, 

further promise to counteract it^ directed him to Aaron his 
brother, who was eloquent ; and who, he was told, was com- 
ing to meet him and would rejoice at the meeting. The 
next words from the Deity were in mandatory tones : 

^'And thou shalt speak unto him, and put words in his 
mouth ; and I will be with thy mouth, and with his mouth, 
and will teach you what ye shall do. And he shall be thy 
spokesman unto the people ; and he shall be, even he shall 
be to thee instead of a mouth and thou shalt be to him 
instead of God. And thou shalt take this rod in thine 
hand, wherewith thou shalt do signs.^' 

There was no further resistance, for every plea was taken 
away from him. The mighty work before him, so over- 
whelming in its nature, so full of dangers and toils, was made 
imperative. God had spoken clearly ; he had to submit. 
Yet, as he took his way back now to his father-in-law's 
house, it was with convulsions of nature within him as if 
the very foundations of his being were becoming upturned. 
He was indeed becoming another man ; he, lately the calm 
recluse among the mountains, the quiet student, the simple 
tender of sheep ! His was a great soul, but it had been 
content with the ideal and with quietude. He had been 
suddenly shaken and waked up. He was now to rise up, to 
abandon for ever all thoughts of retirement and of rest ; and 
to gird all his energies to scenes and troubles where every 
one of his faculties would be tried to the utmost. He 
trembled at the immensity of the work before him, who 
had never been a practical man, mingling with the busy 
world, and was now to be thrust forward as a leader to a 
nation, which was to be lifted by his arm as an instrument, 
out of thraldom into freedom. He trembled and shrank ; 
but, as he walked along now toward Jethro's tent, he felt 
that there was a Presence with him, such as had never been 
80 strikingly in companionship with him before. He trod 
therefore firmly, though humbly, as he went. 



THE MISSION TO DELIVER, 291 

He asked permission at the tent to be allowed to visit his 
brethren in Egypt, and his father-in-law gave it with his 
blessing ; " Go in peace/^ So taking his wife and children, 
and an ass to convey them, he set out on his journey. 
Afterward, however, he sent them back to her father's tent : 
they could be only an impediment, and might meet with 
danger. Indeed, on the way there was a scene only half- 
explained in the Bible record, which caused the performance 
on them of the Hebrew rite, which had hitherto been ne- 
glected. 

Aaron, forewarned by the Deity as had been promised, 
had come to meet him ; and they met among these desert soli- 
tudes, '' in the mount of God ;'' — an agitating meeting, one 
of them so full of great and wonderful purposes laid impera- 
tively upon him, and the other wondering at the meaning 
of the mysteriously given summons to go forth. They com- 
muned together ; and then both proceeded to their work. 

Their work ! They could have no hope in it, except 
what came from God. But as they walked along over the 
Arabian wastes toward the head of the Red Sea gulf, and 
then around it, toward Egypt, they felt always that strange 
Presence ; for God had spoken, and they knew that he was 
with them. 

Having reached Goshen, they assembled the elders of 
their countrymen together, as soon as they could. Aaron, 
the eloquent spokesman, communicated to them what had 
occurred to his brother, and what w^as the great commission 
given; and then the two brothers gave outward demon- 
strations in ^^ signs,'' — doubtless miraculous acts — before the 
people. The people believed ; and when they heard that 
the Lord had visited the children of Israel, and that he had 
looked upon their affliction, they bowed their heads and 
worshipped. 

The next transaction of the two brothers was to be with 
the king himself. 



292 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

CHAPTER XXXI. 
THE DEMAND FOR FREEDOM MADE. 

WE present here the picture of Menephthah, taken care- 
fully from the great work of Lepsius ; and the reader 
will be struck with the expression of face, so similar to 
what we might have imagined in one who, as shown on the 
Egyptian monuments and history, was vacillating, super- 
stitious and weak. We notice also the singular prominence 
on this head of the Urseus or asp, the representative of 
their god Neph, and the emblem of royalty. 

But, however vvanting in real greatness his true charac- 
teristics may have been, he was still the Pharaoh, obeyed 
implicitly, as if a god himself; was absolute and powerful ; 
and his very weakness of character made him more jealous 
respecting honors due to his rank, and more anxious to 
establish a reputation for force. He was even more danger- 
ous to a supposed enemy from the want of that quietude 
which conscious firmness and strength impart. 

Thus we see him in the great palace of the Pharaohs. 

It was with feelings very far different from any that he 
had ever before had in those royal halls, that Moses, accom- 
panied by Aaron, now came and presented himself before the 
monarch. He stood erect now and strong, in the dignity of 
a man, and in the felt especial presence of God. On other oc- 
casions it had been Moses, a dependant, although the adopted 
prince of the household, submitting to be a participant in 
that immense system of Egyptian superstitious worship, and 
probably officiating as priest ; having very many queryings, 
we may believe, starting up in his mind and growing stronger 
every day, respecting the truth of their system; but yet held 
down by the ties from education, his mind still blinded, 
and the struggle within him for light ol'ten feeble and ob- 



THE DEMAND FOR FREEDOM MADE, 393 




MENEPHTHAH (Mari-en-ptheh, Ba-en-Ra), Thought to be the Pharaoh of the 

Exodus, 
(Copied by careful tracing from Lepsius' work.) 

26* 



294 LIFE SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT, 

structed. He had walked these halls of the palace, with 
a great struggle in his heart also, respecting his country- 
men ; intensely indignant at the cruelties exercised upon 
them by their masters, — his associates, and yet repelled by 
the grossness and ignorance among themselves; mourning 
over their degradation, and yet not seeing how they could 
be raised. In their very religion there was a counterpoise to 
any hopes in his mind or to any efforts ; for their notions of 
the Divinity which they acknowledged, were dark, and were 
inoperative upon them ; and while they rejected the refined 
and intellectual system of symbols in use among the Egyp- 
tians, they had scarcely anything definite to offer in its stead. 

Therefore it was as a man puzzled with doubts, in con- 
flict with himself, bowed down, and despising his own posi- 
tion of subserviency to what his heart condemned, that he 
had before trod these royal halls among the royal princes 
and the priests. 

Now it was all far different. He came with a raised-up 
head, a mind clear from mists, a heart strong in its faith in 
God, and with a mien and step such as would be learned 
among the sheikhs and the free wanderers in the desert. 
Above all, he felt that he stood before Pharaoh as a com- 
missioner from Jehovah, and that God was with hira there. 
He and Aaron spake with authority: 

" Thus saith the Lord God of Israel, Let my people go, 
that they may hold a feast unto me in the wilderness.'' 

*^ Who is the Lord that I should obey his voice to let 
Israel go?'' demanded the indignant monarch ; " I know not 
the Lord, neither will I let Israel go." They answered, 

*^ The God of the Hebrews hath met with us : let us go, 
we pray thee, three days' journey into the desert, and sacri- 
fice unto the Lord our God;' lest he fall upon us with 
pestilence or with the sword." 

* Their i)lea for tluit distance had the excuse that some of the animals 
lo be sMrrifir..*! l.v f 1,,' T Ifbrcws were considered as gods by the Egyptians. 



THE DEMAND FOR FREEDOM MADE. 295 

The monarch had heard of them before, and of thei 
assembling the elders, and the sensation which they had 
created among their people: his passion rose: 

" Wherefore do ye, Moses and Aaron, let [hinder] the 
people from their works ? get you unto your burdens/^ 

He added, — as if a rough calculation of losses by this 
interruption in their work was passing through his mind : 
^' Behold, the people of the land now are many, and ye 
make them to rest from their burdens/^ 

On the same day he issued orders to all officers superin- 
tending the servitude of the Israelites, and to the inferior 
taskmasters, to do that which must have made the slavery 
doubly severe and cruel. The edifices in that country were, 
and are still, made of sun-dried bricks, with cut straw 
intermixed to hold the earth together, even the body of 
their great halls being so constructed, and then faced with 
sculptured stones ; and now a mandate was issued that straw 
should no longer be issued to the workmen, but that they 
must search for it themselves; — the same amount of bricks 
still being rigidly required. The Egyptian people could 
withhold the material, and now immediately ensued a scene 
of confusion and terror and aggravated suffering among the 
Israelites throughout the land : for the taskmasters, as we 
may still see on the monuments, plied the lash on the naked 
backs of the workmen. The Hebrew supervisors w^hom the 
taskmasters had set over their countrymen were themselves 
also beaten ; and soon a universal cry of distress and pain 
went up over all the country. When remonstrance was 
carried by the Jewish elders to Pharaoh, he met it with a 
taunting charge of idleness ; to indulge which, he said, they 
were desirous of going into the wilderness for the purpose 
of sacrificing. They were ordered out to their work, which 
was not to be diminished, but to be everywhere exacted. 
On their way they met Moses and Aaron, and cried out to 
them — 



296 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT, 

"The Lord look upon you and judge; because ye have 
made our savor to be abhorred in the eyes of Pharaoh, and 
in the eyes of his servants, to put a sword into their hands 
to slay us/' 

" Was this the deliverance !" — Moses might well think : — 
for he seemed to be deserted of God, and men were all 
against him ; the Hebrew elders were upbraiding him ; all 
over the country was but aggravated distress, a cry of anguish 
from men, women and children ; he felt that he was hated 
and despised by all. Even Aaron seems to have shrunk back 
from his distressed brother, who appears to have gone alone 
before God. It was a bitter cry that came from him ; — 

" Lord, wherefore hast thou so evil-entreated this people ? 
why is it that thou hast sent me? For since I came to 
Pharaoh to speak in thy name, he hath done evil to this 
people ; neither hast thou delivered thy people at all/^ 

The reply to him from Jehovah was — 

" Now shalt thou see what I will do to Pharaoh : for with 
a strong hand shall he let them go, and with a strong hand 
shall he drive them out of his land ;'' and then he was re- 
minded of the covenant which God had made with his fore- 
fathers, and was directed to go again to the Jewish elders, 
with fresh assurances that this covenant would be faithfully 
carried into effect. 

He went to them, but they were not in a spirit to receive 
the message: they had no room for trust; for their hearts 
were full of one bitter feeling ; the lash was sounding in 
their ears ; the cry from mental anguish and bodily pain 
drowned all other sounds. They would not listen to him. 

Moses bowed his head in humiliation, and shame and 
chagrin; and again GoiFs voice was heard by him, 

"Go in, speak unto Pharaoh, king of Egypt, that he let 
the children of Egypt go out of his land.'' The discouraged 
man replied — 

" Behold, the children of Israel have not hearkened unto 



THE DEMAND FOR FREEDOM MADE, 297 

me; how then shall Pharaoh hear me, who am of uncir- 
cumeised lips T^ 

In these troubles we have not heard of Aaron, and Moses 
seems to have distrusted all things, — his people, his brother, 
almost his God, with his promises and covenants. His heart 
was utterly crushed. 

Yet still he was kept to duty. He was told now to take 
Aaron with him, and directed, ^^Thou shalt speak all that 
I command thee ;'^ told to go before Pharaoh and request 
him, " That he send the children of Israel out of his land/^ 
and was informed that the monarch would not listen to him 
to any practical purpose, until God should lay his hand in 
judgment upon Egypt, and bring out Israel with a power- 
ful hand. 

Moses and Aaron went. They had been previously 
directed by the Deity how to act, in case the monarch 
should demand of them a miracle or sign of their commis- 
sion, which he might be expected to do. Who were they ? 
What proof could they offer of their high claims for divine 
appointment? Why should he listen at all to them — these 
men of the abject race? What sign could they show? 

We know that Egypt was a country of great supersti- 
tions ; and we have seen that this present monarch was 
probably remarkable even there for such traits ; and the 
proofs for the divine commission given to these two men 
were adapted to such a character. These were to be cumu- 
lative ; appealing one after another to his senses of sight 
and feeling, and to his humanity toward his own subjects, 
if he had none for the enslaved : and if he resisted, then 
the climax was to be a distressing visitation penetrating the 
recesses of the royal household itself. 

We look now into these lordly halls ; with the massive 
and richly sculptured columns around ; with the images of 
gods looking down on the scenes beneath ; with the stories 
of ancestral battles and triumphs cut in stone and speaking 



29^ LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

to the ey.e on every side ; and with the gorgeousness of rich 
hangings and adornments in silver and gold and gems. We 
see also sitting there, the monarch absolute in physical 
power though mentally weak ; and around him, the standing 
courtiers; and then, in front of him, in the open area by the 
throne, these two men of the abject, despised race, one with 
a rod in his hand, come once more to deliver their request 
that he would let their people go. 

He demanded a miracle. Aaron, according to the previous 
admonition to Moses, took the rod and cast it down before 
the king. It became a serpent. The monarch believing 
that they were only necromancers in a country famous then, 
as it is now, for its skill in such deeds, sent for his " wise 
men and the sorcerers,^^ who at his command " cast down 
every man his rod, and they became serpents : but Aaron's 
rod swallowed up their rods.'' The only effect on the king 
was to make him more settled and firm in his purpose 
than before. 

Another effort at moving him was made. 

Moses and his brother were directed to meet the monarch 
on his visit to the river in the morning ; and standing on 
its brink, to declare again their commission to him, and as a 
proof of it, to stretch the rod over the waters of Egypt in 
all directions, changing them by this act into blood. It 
was done, and the river ran blood ; the water in vessels 
in their houses was changed to blood; the fish died; the 
river became offensive to the smell. Their great stream 
seemed suddenly to have become their enemy, to have 
changed so as to be an offence and a disgusting sight to all 
the people. But " the magicians of Egypt did so with their en- 
chantments," changing in a similar manner the water drawn 
from wells. 'The king was still not convinced. The dis- 
tress in the country, however, was universal : for seven days 
the inhabitants had to dig wells in order to supply them- 
selves with water for domestic use. 



THE DEMAND FOR FREEDOM MADE. 299 

Another trial was now naade for the same purpose, after 
another refusal of the monarch to let the people go. He 
had been warned of the result of his refusal; and on his 
persisting, the rod was stretched over the land, and frogs 
came up from the river and spread over the country, — into 
the houses, and bed-chambers, and ovens, and kneading- 
troughs. The magicians on being summoned brought simi- 
lar animals from the river ; but the general nuisance had 
become so grievous and was so disgusting, that the king 
became earnest to have it removed. He sent for Moses and 
Aaron and solicited them to that effect ; — the first symptom 
of any salutary effect on the sovereign's mind. They asked 
him to appoint^ a time for their prayers to that effect: he 
did so, and at the hour specified, the living cause was 
removed, though the effect remained; for the frogs perishing 
corrupted the atmosphere. 

Still the monarch refused; and another demonstration 
was made. Aaron stretched out his hand, and ^^ all the 
dust of the land became lice throughout all the land of 
Egypt.'' Pharaoh, however, was still unmoved, although 
the magicians acknowledged that their imitative power was 
now at an end. 

Still another trial was made, after another appeal ^^ to let 
!j the people go ;" and this was by bringing flies over all the 
i country, filling the houses, and swarming upon the ground, 
\ till ^^ the land was corrupted by reason of the swarm of 
t| flies." It had been previously declared that the lands of 
y Goshen should be excepted from this visitation, which was 
accordingly found to be true. 

Pharaoh now sent for the two brothers and told them 
that he would allow the Israelites to offer sacrifices in Egypt 
itself; but this proposal was rejected on the plea that 

l\ ^ 

' In our translation, " Glory over me :" the ancient translators, more 
Itagreeablv to the context, had it, " command," or " appoint to me." 



300 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT, 

offence would be taken by the Egyptians on seeing what the 
sacrifice was. He then said that they might go a little way 
into the wilderness for the purpose ; and begged them to 
entreat God to remove the plague. They consented to make 
such entreaty, but with a caution to him against dealing 
with them deceitfully. The plague ceased at their prayer. 

It is a law of our nature that the heart of man grows 
either better or worse from every trial which it endures, 
stronger always either for good purposes or for bad. This 
law was operating on Pharaoh's heart. To the simple 
refusal at first, he was now adding prevarication and deceit. 
The plague had been removed, but he still refused. 

But a more terrible visitation came now, that of murrain 
upon all Egyptian cattle and sheep, horses, asses and camels, 
which were out in the field.^ The monarch had been fore- 
warned by Moses that such would be the case if he should 
persist in his refusal, and that the Israelites should be ex- 
empted from the evil. Murrain is not unknown in that 
country even in our times f but this was a thorough exter- 
mination of all Egyptian animals left in the fields: Pharaoh, 
on sending to the residences of the Israelites and discovering 
that they had entirely escaped, must have felt that the visi- 
tation was a peculiar one. Still he was obstinate : it was a 
part of his obtuse nature to be so, and he was doubtless 
encouraged in his pertinacity by the magicians and priests. 



» Wilkinson says, " The custom of feeding some of their herds in sheds 
[in the rising of the river] accords with the Scripture account of the pre- 
servation of the cattle which had been brought home from the field, and 
explains the apparent contradiction of the destruction of all the cattle 
of Egypt by the murrain and the subsequent death of the cattle by the 
hail, those which were in the field alone having suflfered from the previous 
plague and those in the stalls or houses having been preserved." Second 
Series of Manners and Customs of the Ancient Egyptians. 

« During Lepsius' visit in 1842, 40,000 cattle perished in Egypt by 
murrain. 



THE DEMAND FOR FREEDOM MADE. 30 1 

But a plague now came which reached even them. God 
commanded Moses and Aaron to take ashes of the furnace 
and to sprinkle these in the air before Pharaoh; and on 
their doing so, the fine particles spread as dust over all the 
land, and where it settled, became '^ a boil breaking forth 
with blains upon man and upon beast/^ throughout the 
country. No one escaped. 

Still no yielding on the part of the monarch ; and after 
a message from God to him, declaring, '' I will at this time 
send all my plagues upon thine heart, and upon thy servants 
and upon thy people : that thou mayest know that there is 
none like me in all the earth,^* a plague of hail was threat- 
ened, destructive to all cattle and to every man it would find 
in the field. 

It came on the morrow, — thunder and hail and fire also 
mingling with it, destroying every herb and shattering the 
trees and smiting man and beast.^ The district of Goshen 
alone was spared. It was such a fury of the elements that 
all hearts quailed before it ; and the monarch sent hastily 
for the two brothers. He cried to them, 

" I have sinned this time : the Lord is righteous, and I 
and my people are wicked. Entreat the Lord (for it is 
enough) that there may be no more mighty thunderings and 
hail : and I will let you go and ye shall stay no longer.^^ 

They did so on their going out of the city, and the storm 
ceased ; but with its ceasing the fright of the monarch also 
ceased, and his heart, and those of the men around him, 
returned to their former obstinacy and perverseness. 

* Lepsius witnessed visitations in this country bv both hail and locusts. 
The first was a rain and hail storm at Ghizeh. " Suddenly the storm of 
wind became a regular hurricane, such as I had never experienced in 
Europe, and a hail storm came down on us which almost turned day into 
night." " Then," he adds, " came the locusts, whose young fry have now 
[May 31st, 1842] increased like sand upon the seashore, and are again 
devouring the green fields and trees, which, combined with the cattle dis- 
e, is, indeed, sufficient to cause a famine." 
26 



302 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

Then " the Lord said unto Moses, go in unto Pharaoh : 
for I have hardened his heart, and the heart of his servants ; 
that I might show these my signs before him : and that 
thou mayest tell in the ears of thy son and of thy son's son 
what things I have wrought in Egypt, and my signs which I 
have done among them ; that ye may know how that I am 
the Lord/' 

He went and threatened, that if the monarch should still be 
obstinate, then on the morrow a plague of locusts would 
come upon them, which should eat up every green thing that 
had been spared, and fill all houses, even the palace ; — such 
a visitation as " neither thy fathers, nor thy fathers' fathers 
have seen since the day that they were upon the earth unto 
this day." He turned then and left the royal presence. The 
people around the monarch were appalled. Their cattle dead; 
many of their people killed by the hail; their crops above 
ground destroyed ; and now locusts to come, in such num- 
bers as would leave no green thing behind.^ Starvation was 
threatening ; what was to be the end ? They were worn out 
by this succession of plagues ; their case was desperate. At 
last they spoke out to the king, 

'' How long shall this man be a snare unto us? Let the 
men go that they may serve the Lord their God : knowest 
thou not yet that Egypt is destroyed ?" 

Moses and Aaron were sent for; and he said, "Go and 
serve the Lord your God : but who are they that shall go?" 
The answer was that all must go, old and young, and with 
flocks and herds: '' for we must hold a feast unto the Lord." 
The monarch was enraged : 

" Let the Lord be so with you," he cried, "as I will let 



* Baron de Tott says of locusts in Asia : " Their approach darkens the 
horizon, and so enormous is tlieir multitude, it hides the light of the sun. 
They li^ht on tlie fields and tlicre form a bed six or seven inches thick." 

Dr. Shaw wrote of them in Harbary, "They entered into our very houses 
and bed-chambers like so mahv thieves." 



THE DEMAND FOR FREEDOM MADE, 303 

you go and your little ones : look to it ; for evil is before 
you/' 

He offered to let the men of the Israelite nation go to the 
feast ; but women and children, who would be pledges for 
the return of the men, were to remain. The offer was re- 
fused ; and then Moses and Aaron '^ were driven out from 
Pharaoh's presence/' 

The plague was sent. Moses was commanded by the 
Deity to stretch out his hand over the land ; and an east 
wind blew and brought locusts filling the sky till the land 
was darkened : — " before them there were no such locusts as 
they, neither after them shall there be such." Everything 
green on the ground or among the trees was eaten up, the 
land was stripped bare. 

The king sent for Moses and Aaron in haste ; and said to 
them, — 

"I have sinned against the Lord your God, and against 
you. Now, therefore, forgive, I pray thee, my sin only this 
once, and entreat the Lord your God that he may take away 
from me this death only." 

They complied ; and a strong west wind rising immedi- 
ately afterward, carried off the locusts toward the Red Sea 
till not one was left behind. 

But the king's obstinacy was not yet overcome. His 
heart, under the repetitions of these trials only grew harder, 
and his will more perverse. His people were beginning to 
be in despair ; for the monarch's pertinacity returned after 
every discomfiture ; there seemed to be no end of these 
visitations, and the miseries from them were increasing in 
intensity. All hearts were quaking through fear of the 
future. What would come next ? The monarch's obstinacy 
was unyielding ; sacred as he was in their eyes — the repre- 
sentative of their god, Phra, — it was evident to them that 
he was in antagonism to some mysterious power, having all 
nature at its command. These two men, the commissioners 



304 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

from that invisible, mysterious power, had, through that 
strange Might upholding them, risen into colossal propor- 
tions before the nation ; were regarded with overwhelming 
fear by the Egyptians, and were looked upon with hope and 
confidence by their brethren, the slaves scattered over the 
land. These slaves were already restive ; were beginning 
to talk confidently of freedom; were even now showing 
signs of resistance to the taskmasters ; the old feelings of 
hatred to their oppressors, of personal enmities, of long 
pent-up earnestness for revenge, were beginning now to 
bubble up, ready to overflow by means of this new heat 
applied to the great caldron of their passions. — What was 
in the future ? What was coming next ? 

The Egyptians might indeed well ask this, — for their 
king was set in his obstinacy. While they were still asking 
it, they noticed with horror a darkness settling over their 
land, so thick and black that it seemed finally to be a black- 
ness of darkness that might be touched and felt. It lasted 
for three days. Men^s hearts gave way utterly under it. 
With light for our eyes, we can meet evils advisedly and 
combat them ; but here, in this utter extinction of all light, 
terrors were magnified, fears had the entire rule, the black- 
ness filling and oppressing the atmosphere filled also men's 
hearts, giving to them the blackness of horror and despair. 

So people sat in their Egyptian homes, and talked in the 
long darkness; sometimes in whispers, as if fearful of 
rousing still more the mysterious power around them; 
sometimes breaking into loud outcries from present distress; 
sometimes filled with ai)[)rehensions of greater terrors yet 
to come. ^^ They saw not one another, neither rose any from 
his place for three days." They were afraid to move ; jear 
had universal i^le. 

The Israelites, however, had light as usual, at Goshen. 

Sitting down now at Goshen, during the horrors of that 
blackness of darkness in the rest of the land, we will our- 



THE DEMAND FOR FREEDOM MADE, 305 

selves converse about such mysteries. Of course these vis- 
itations upon the Egyptians were miraculous : and we are to 
have before us in this book still greater miracles for our 
contemplation; — the crossing of the Red Sea; the feeding 
of more than two millions of people, for nearly forty years, 
with manna in the wilderness, with water also, and other 
necessaries of life ; beside other instances of deliverances and 
of God's care. 

What is a miracle? It is a suspension or a reversal of 
the. ordinary laws over physical matter. God, for the safety 
and w^ell-being of his creatures, proceeds by a uniformity 
of action, which we call a law or laws of nature. A law 
of nature is simply a uniformity of action on the part of the 
Creator, without which his creatures could have no antici- 
pation of, and make no preparation for, the future. It is 
for our good that it should be so : and equally for the same 
reason, we may expect the Deity to depart from this uni- 
formity, when, in his wisdom and benevolence, he sees this 
to be requisite. A miracle is therefore no more impossible, 
and no more an improbability as regards the Deity, than is 
a law of nature, when as good a reason occurs for a miracle. 
But the very reason for a law^ of nature will render miracles 
a rare occurrence ; and also, we may expect them only when 
the occasion is worthy of such unusual action of Divine 
Providence. 

Now in these writings in our Scriptures we have God in 
history, God is always in history, but man in his blindness 
cannot always see him or find him out. Man, even in most 
advanced age and in his wisest state of intellect in this 
world, is but infantile compared with the infinities of know- 
ledge, and of time. Even Newton could put his hands 
on only a few links in the endless chain of knowledge, and 
then could go no further. So with all men. We know a 
few of the qualities of things, as of electricity, of light, of 
heat, etc. ; but what is electricity ? what is light ? what is 

26 * 



3o6 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT, 

heat ? And if so in physical matter, what must it be with 
God's moral dealings with his creatures? Our ignorance is 
still greater there, because these subjects are more abstruse, 
and more hidden from our sight. And yet knowledge on 
these things is far more important to us than knowledge on 
the others. 

For instance, if we could really see God in all history, 
the knowledge would be of the highest importance to us. 
But we cannot. History is too large and too wide for us, 
and our faculties are too limited and our time here too 
short. We cannot trace God and the workings of his moral 
laws, even in a small community, or even in one individual, 
although the Deity and his laws are operating in all. 

But we have a history in which God comes revealed, — 
not fully, because for this neither our faculties nor our 
condition will admit ; yet so that we can study him there ; 
and there also get the clue for studying him in all other 
history, if we so desire. In the Jewish history he makes a 
demonstration of himself; not continuously, but in flashes 
here and there ; and we are not only able to recognize him 
there, but also by means of this history we may also be able 
to recognize him in other histories, where it is important 
that we should do so. 

Here, for instance, in the case now under consideration, 
were slaves to be set free. They were people recognizing him 
— feebly, it is true — but still exercising that recognition; and 
therefore objects of his especial care. He desired to free them. 
They were important to their masters, essential indeed to the 
ease of the Egyptians, who were, of course, unwilling to 
part with them. God produces their liberation through a 
series of acts which, to our apprehension, are evident mir- 
acles — things where he has plainly impressed his power, and 
we can clearly see him in the acts. Such demonstrations 
of himself, — if we mortals can, and dare, judge of the In- 
finite — were worthy of him ; for we have in the history of 



THE DEMAND FOR FREEDOM MADE, 307 

the Israelites, a clue by which we can trace him in all his- 
tory. Nations ever since have looked for God in history, 
and to some degree have found him there ; and far oftener 
should we find him, if we were to try with clearer purposes 
of right in our hearts, through this clue given to us in the 
history of this people written by himself, with himself and 
with his laws for nations exhibited there. Nor is this 
period in Egypt now under consideration so far exceptional 
to all history as it may seem to us to be. It appears to be 
exceptional, because the facts belonging to it, back of what 
human eyes can see, are revealed to us in Scripture : but we 
have lately had a brushing away of slavery from our own 
country, and by ways that every one must acknowledge to be 
strangely exceptional, and by means entirely unforeseen and 
unexpected. If God in the history of this recent deliver- 
ance could be shown to us by revelation, we might possibly 
see many acts as exceptional as those in the deliverance from 
Egypt, although they seem now to us to have been according 
to the usual laws regulating our world. There is, doubtless, 
in all human affairs a mingling, inexplicable by us, of the 
exceptional and the regular in nature ; and of the Divine 
sovereignty harmonizing with man^s free agency. We know 
and can know but little of the infinite in God, but it was 
important for us that such demonstrations of his constant 
rulership over the world as we can understand should be 
made to us; and they are made in revelation, — very 
strikingly in the case which we are now considering. 

There was one more demonstration to be made. It was 
to be the slaying of all the first-born in Egypt. Many a 
heart has recoiled from that strange, horrible winding up of 
these miracles ; and has stood contemplating it with silent 
queryings about God as a doer of such things : and yet — 
and the coincidence is a very singular one — we have just 
been going through scenes in ouf own country, where the 
first-born in it, — that is, our bravest and our best, very 



3o8 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT, 

many thousands of them, — have been slain, and this result- 
ing also in a deliverance from cruel slavery. This last has 
seemed to us to be according to the laws among men ; but it 
may well set us to thinking ; and in these thoughts we shall 
find many helps from this history of the Israelites so full 
of the miraculous in the delivery from bondage in Egypt. 
God's acts among nations even now seem very often to take 
the form of miracles. 

At the end of the third day of this darkness which might 
" be felt/' Pharaoh sent for Moses and Aaron. A strong 
and fearful compulsion was upon him, but he wished still 
to keep a hold upon the Israelites. It has been obvious 
that from the very first, he understood fully the meaning of 
the demands by Moses. 

'' Go ye/' he said, ^^ serve the Lord : only let your flocks 
and your herds be stayed : let your little ones also go with 
you." The answer was, 

" Thou must give us also sacrifices, and burnt-oiferings, 
that we may sacrifice unto the Lord our God. Our cattle 
also shall go with us : there shall not an hoof be left be- 
hind : for thereof must we take to serve the Lord our God; 
and we know not with what we must serve the Lord, until 
we come thither." 

The issue between the two had now been fully made. 
Pharaoh's feelings grew stern and determined. 

^'Get thee from me/' he cried, "take heed to thyself, see 
my face no more ; for in that day thou seest my face, thou 
shalt surely die." The answer was — 

" Thou hast spoken well, I will see thy face again no 



THE EXODUS, 309 



CHAPTER XXXII. 
THE EXODUS, 

WHILE the events in the last chapter were transpiring, 
the Israelites, scattered all over the land, were agi- 
tated, anxious, nervous, and watchful. Their home was 
chiefly still at Goshen, but a very large number of them, 
called upon for servile work, were engaged in the quarries at 
the mountains bordering the Nile-valley eastwardly, and 
also at the various constructions going on in the country and 
at preparing bricks, and as slaves in agricultural work. 
Ignorant they were, debased, brutalized by the unremitting 
hard work. They were closely watched by their task- 
masters ; but from the first of these proceedings news had 
been spread among them by stealthy messengers, and where 
speech was not allowed, by secret signs ; and they knew, 
more or less clearly, of the demands by Moses for their 
deliverance. Then came the plagues, one after another, all 
open to the observation of slave as well as master ; and hope 
crept into the hearts of the former and increased, while the 
alarm of the latter was also obvious. The lash of the task- 
master was less frequent and less severe, unless in instances 
where madness in revenge nerved the overseer's arm. 
Wonderings and queryings, alarms or hopes were agitating 
the communities everywhere in city and country ; and the 
Israelites were beginning to look in earnest expectation, and, 
where they could do it stealthily, to move toward their 
homes in Goshen. After a while, when hail and locusts 
had destroyed all vegetation, many of the Egyptian masters 
were willing to be saved from the necessity of feeding their 
slaves, and from this cause or disgust, bade them depart : 
and thus there was a gradual congregating of the Hebrew 



3IO LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

race down in the north-east corner of the land. Doubtless 
among the early items of news carried to them over the 
country was one also, that they were to ask or seek^ from 
the Egyptians valuable articles of easy transportation, — 
jewels of silver and gold ; and this was now repeated with 
greater urgency : for they were stimulated by a feeling that 
a crisis was approaching, and the native people were often 
anxious to propitiate them, and perhaps their God, by a 
ready yielding to such requests. The slaves felt that they 
had fairly earned all that they now received. " Moreover, 
the man Moses was very great in the land of Egypt, in the 
sight of Pharaoh^s servants, and in the sight of the people.'^ 
There was, however, no plundering by the expectant He- 
brews. Both portions of the community now waited in 
subdued silence and terror for the next development. It 
was to be a frightful one, as declared by Moses to Pharaoh 
just before leaving the royal presence. It was — 

'' Thus saith the Lord. About midnight will I go out 
into the midst of Egypt : and all the first-born in the land 
of Egypt shall die, from the first-born of Pharaoh that 
sitteth upon his throne, even unto the first-born of the 
maid-servant that is behind the mill ; and all the first- 
born of beasts. And there shall be a cry throughout all the 
land of Egypt, such as there was none like it, nor shall be 
like it any more. But against the children of Israel shall 
not a dog move his tongue, against man or beast : that ye 
may know how that the Lord doth ])ut a difference between 
the Egyptians and Israel. And all these thy servants shall 
come down unto me, and bow down themselves unto me, 
saying, Get thee out, and all the pcoi)le that follow thee; 
after that will I go out.'^ Then in anger he had left the 
royal presence. 



« The meaning of the Hebrew word is to ask^ demand^ require^ seek, beg, 
requesty interrogate, borrow, lend. 



THE EXODUS. 31 1 

The same supernatural admonitions which had guided 
him all along, informed him now that the monarch would 
not yield until after this visitation ; but that then deliver- 
ance would come. He and Aaron began therefore to prepare 
their people for a sudden departure. 

Consternation was now everywhere seizing upon the 
Egyptians. Reports of this recent interview between their 
king and Moses, and of the threats of the latter, had spread 
with the rapidity which must spring from such an awful warn- 
ing ; and the strict fulfilment of previous threats seemed to 
warrant belief in the coming fulfilment of this. But the 
idea was most horrible! A devoted victim in every family, 
from the king to his meanest subject ! And there was to be 
no escape ; no avoidance ; for ^the same mysterious Power 
which had already heaped so many woes upon them was to 
send and govern this ! All hearts were filled with a deep 
and settled agony of fear. The victims that were to be, 
writhed and shrieked or grovelled in their fearful ex- 
pectancy : friends looked on aghast : tears and shrieks 
and horror were in every house, even before the visitation 
came. 

The Hebrews, in the mean time, were making their 
preparations. Moses had issued an ordinance declaring that 
this month, Abib, was always hereafter to be the beginning 
of their year. On the 10th of it, each family, or if too 
small in number, then united with others, were now to 
take a lamb or goat '' of the first year/^ and on the 14th 
were to sacrifice it, and then, with a bunch of hyssop to 
sprinkle its blood on " the two side-posts and on the upper 
door-post'^ of their houses, so that the destroying angel 
coming at the following midnight might know that he 
was not to enter this dwelling. They were to eat the flesh 
that night ; as he said, " with your loins girded, your shoes 
on your feet, and your staff in your hand : and ye shall eat 
it in haste." This was to be called the Passover, a word 



312 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

commemorative of the angePs passing by their dwellings, 
and such feast was to be observed as a memorial in all the 
future generations of Israel. The elders of the people had 
now been called together, and directions had been given to 
them, and thence had been circulated among all the com- 
munities in Goshen. Then the lamb or goat, having been 
killed, and the blood sprinkled, and the offering eaten with 
staff in hand and sandals on the feet, — the people waited 
in such a nervous, agitated state of feeling as it is impossible 
for any one to describe. 

The Egyptians also were waiting. A pall of horror was 
over the land. They knew of the orders issued to the 
Hebrews, and knew that this was to be the night. En- 
circled, hemmed in, doomed, they waited ; looking at each 
other with ghastly faces, as the hours of that night began to 
pass by. Wailings, groans, fear, horror were in every 
house. Every sound was startling ; and yet silence was 
more terrible than noise. 

— Midnight came. — ^^ There was a great cry in Egypt 
for there was not a house where there was not one dead.^' 
The first-born in the land, " from the first-born of Pharaoh 
that sat on his throne, unto the first-born of the captive 
that was in the dungeon ; and all the first-born of cattle,^* 
— all were deady struck down ! smitten by that invisible poioer, 
to which resistance was felt to be all m vain, 

Pharaoh sent for INIoses and Aaron. They found a 
pale, ghastly throng of courtiers around the horror-stricken 
monarch. He cried, 

^^ Rise* up and get you forth from among my people, both 
ye and the children of Israel : and go, serve the Lord, as 
ye have said. Also take your flocks and your herds, as ye 
have said, and be gone: and bless me also." 

The courtiers joined in the entreaty, and outside, there 
was the same urgency for the Hebrews to be gone ^^in 
haste : for they said. We be all dead nien.'^ 



THE EXODUS. 313 

As day came, first tinting the sky with faintest hue, and 
then rapidly growing out into full splendor, as it always does 
in that country, it opened upon a whole immense nation in 
motion : for the Israelites had been expecting to move and 
were prepared for it ; and they all felt that there might be 
a necessity for rapid movement. For no one could tell 
when there would be a change in the mind of this fickle 
monarch and of his people, when they should recover from 
the shock of their loss during the night. Resentment and 
a stern desire for revenge would also then be added to all 
the previous feelings of the Egyptians. 

So the Israelites hastened : and as the sun was casting his 
early beams over this level landscape, it fell on more than 
two millions^ of people in motion, with their cattle and 



^ Eobinson supposes them to have been equal to about two and a half mil- 
lions, estimated probably from the number of those twenty years and upward 
"able to go forth to war," which was 603,550 (Num. i. 46). The amount of 
these numbers need not surprise us, if we remember that Jacob was the head 
not only of a family but of a tribe ; and the number that Abraham reckoned 
(three hundred and eighteen fighting men) among his retainers. These, by 
the Jewish rite, were incorporated into his family (Gen. xvii. 13) ; and we 
may suppose an equal number similarly situated in the tribe of Jacob. 
His own family amounted to seventy-nine when he emigrated to Egypt. 
If we allow thirty-six years to a generation, or six generations between 
that time and the Exodus, and a multiplication by six to each individual, 
we shall have more than three millions of Jacob's own descendants. We 
are informed (Ex. i. 7), that the people " increased abundantly and multi- 
plied and waxed exceeding mighty :" but this was not all ; for in the 
Exodus it is recorded that " a mixed multitude went up also with them" 
(Ex. xii. 38), probably people who had been slaves like themselves and 
were glad to escape in their company. 

Adam Clarke, in his Commentary, estimates their whole number at 
3,263,000. 

The Eev. Dr. Cumming, in his work, " Moses Right and Bishop Colenso 
Wrong,'' has a passage from which we extract the following : 

"We are told that a special blessing of vast increase of seed was 

repeatedly promised (Gen. xii. 2 ; xv. 5 ; xvii. 6 ; xxii. 17), and renewed 

to Isaac (xxv. 23) and Jacob xxviii. 14 ; xxxii. 12; xlvi. 3). We are told 

that this blessing rested specially on the Israelites in Egypt (Ex. i. 7). We 

27 



SH LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

such articles as they could conveniently transport. The 
habits of a nomadic life helped them now greatly in this 
rapid exodus, for many of them had been accustomed to 
sudden transits from place to place. A confused multitude 
they were, in spite of any eflPorts of their elders to reduce 
them to order ; for they had at present only one wish, — that 
of a rapid escape and safety. Behind them was the land of 
bondage, with memorials all over it of their groans, and of 
stripes inflicted, and of long years of suffering ; with them 
now was relief; before them was a prospect of safety. 
Therefore, confusedly, nervously, rapidly, the immense 
throng, covering all the country as far as the eye could 
reach, were in motion, rejoicing, wondering, felicitating each 
other, and yet indeed scarcely able to believe in the actuality 
of their escape. It was all so strange and so much like a 
dream, that they felt as if they might yet awake and be 
aroused to the old frightful realities. Thus in confusion 
they hurried on, covering all the landscape. The number 
was immense, seemingly countless ; for in addition to the 



are told that Joseph saw Epliraim^s children of the third generation, etc. 
(Gen. 1. 23). Joseph was about thirty-four years of age when his sons 
were bom (Gen. xli. 46-50), and he died aged one hundred and ten years 
(1. 26) ; hence it follows that, in this instance, the fourth generation was 
born and four generations were alive together only seventy-five years after 
the descent into Egypt. We are told tliat Joshua was the tenth descent 
from Joseph (1 Chron. vii. 22-27); that is, there were ten generations within 
the space of two hundred and fifteen years' residence in Egypt. . . . We have 
many incidental proofs that the Israelites married very young, and that 
three or four generations were often alive together. . . . Suppose that two 
hundred and fifteen years in Egypt equalled seven generations. Suppose 
that each man had four sons at the age of thirty (Benjamin had ten before 
that time) : suppose the number of males that went down and afterward 
became fathers to be sixty-seven. Calculating upon these data, the num- 
ber of souls at tlie Exodus would amount to 2,195,456. And this does 
not include the descendants of Jacob's servants, who were doubtless 
numerous : nor does it take into account additional children born after the 
father attained the age of thirty, nor the more rapid increase of those born 
before that age." 



THE EXODUS. 315 

Israelites, was with them " a mixed multitude'' of other 
people^ taking advantage of this opportunity to escape^ 

Their course, they were after a while surprised to find, 
was south-eastwardly.^ Palestine, to which they knew that 
they were bound, was toward the north, and comparatively but 
a short distance off; but this south-easterly course would be 
a long one, and might involve them in dangerous complica- 
tions ; but at present their joy on the deliverance mastered 
all other feelings and checked all doubts. Then, as time 
passed, they saw before them in the sky, a cloud in the 
form of a pillar, which seemed to be placed there as a guide; 
for, as they advanced, it still continued and kept its position 
in advance. All day it led them, — this strange pillar-shaped 
cloud — guiding them toward the south-east ; then, when the 
day closed and night was setting in, it changed to a pillar 
of fire, up before them in the sky. This rested finally as a 
sign for them to rest : they were indeed tired, and thank- 
ful for the signal to stop. Resting and gazing upward at 
that light, so different from anything that they had ever 
before seen, not flickering as if to be transient, not scintilla- 
ting as if exhausting itself, but a quiet, gentle light, giving 
illumination, but not dazzling to the eye ; — gazing upward 
at it, they felt that God was still with them in an especial 
manner : and so they lay down, trustingly, for their much- 
needed repose. 

Their day's journey, — or it may perhaps more properly 
be called flight — had been from Eameses to Succoth, the 
former of which we have seen to be at the eastern termi- 
nation of the canal cut by the monarch of that name. 
The position of the latter can only be conjectured ; but inas- 
much as we know that their direction was toward the head 



» Ex. xii. 38. 

* The reason for this is given in Ex. xiii. 17 : " for God said Lest, perad- 
venture, the people repent when they see war, and they return to Egypt." 



3i6 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

General Map, showing the Region of the Journeyings of the Israelites. 




23. Rameses, the starting-point in the Exodus. 

1. Su(>z. 

2. Fountains Naba and Musa. 

3. Fountain believed tol>e " Marah." 

4. Fountain believe*! to be " Elini." 
6,5. Supposed to be the " Desort of Sin." 

6. Mount Serbal. 

7. Mount Sinai. 

8. A in Fludhera, supposed to be Hazeroth. 

9. Kl Ain. 

10. Akabali, about the sites of Ezion-gaber and Elath. 

11. Wady Ithni, by wliich the Israelites are supposed to have passed to the east of Edom. 

12. River of Kgypt and its confluents. 

13. Waily .I«rafeh (pr()bHl)le route of the Israelites fVom Hazerotli to Eadesh-barnea). 

14. Supposed to be Kadesh-barnea. 

15. Es Sufah, supposed site of the defeat of the Israelites. 

16. RoerHheba. 

17. Oerar (near the present Qaza). 

18. Hebron. 

19. Dead Sea. 

20. Wady Ohuweir (probably ♦' the king's highway" into Edom), Num. xx. 17. 

21. Mount Hor. 

22. Pelusium, probably the ancient Avarls. 



THE EXODUS, 317 

of the gulf of Suez, distant thirty-five miles, and that they 
were three days in getting to this latter, we may form a 
conclusion with tolerable certainty respecting the place. Its 
name signifies " Booths/^ 

The time of the year corresponded to the beginning of 
our April.^ The Israelites, notwithstanding the novelty of 
their situation at Succoth slept soundly, worn out as they 
were by the previous night's watching and excitements, and 
the day's march ; and in the morning, as they waked up at 
Succoth, it required a moment or two for them to gather up 
their recollections, and to know that they were actually /ree. 
Free ! the thought sent a thrill through their hearts ; and 
they were soon on their feet looking around at the strange 
scenes of this immense multitude rising into life, and of the 
increasing activity on the w^ide, open ground. And, up in 
the sky, rested still that cloud-like, huge pillar, which pre- 
sently also began to be in motion, still conducting them toward 
the south-east. The provisions which they had brought 
with them from Egypt furnished them with bread and fruit ; 
their flocks and cattle, of which they had abundance, with 
milk and meat. Then quickly over that immense extent of 
country was a whole nation in motion ; and everywhere, as 
they went along, were heard shouts of joy, instruments of 
music, laughter and other sounds of cheerfulness and happi- 
ness filling the morning air. Yet, as they proceeded, with 
the more thoughtful were many apprehensions of dangers 
that might yet come from Egypt, and many a glance back- 
ward to note the signs on the horizon toward the west. 

But no danger appeared. The great company went on ; 
travelling more slowly this day than on the previous one ; 
for the children were becoming foot-sore; and there were 
many infants and aged people whose comfort had to be con- 



^ This was the 16th of Abib : Abib answers to a part of our March and 
April. 

27* 



3l8 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

suited. The first exhilaration of their escape had passed, 
and fatigue was beginning to be felt. The cloud conduct- 
ing them was watched more and more earnestly by many 
thousands of tired ones in the vast moving throngs, some of 
them, as the hours passed on, beginning to change their glad 
laughter into sounds of complaint ; and when at last the 
pillar of cloud stopped near a place called Etham, the mul- 
titudes welcomed the rest. Many of the elders, however, 
remembered with deep anxiety, that they were yet only 
twenty-five miles from Rameses, and that just back of it was 
the powerful Egyptian nation now, probably, beginning to 
wake up from the stupor of its terrible visitation, and per- 
haps, also, to indulge a desire for revenge. 

The situation of Etham is not known, except that it was 
at the termination of the cultivated ground and at the be- 
ginning of the wilderness. Beyond it, eastwardly, was bare, 
hard ground, covered with black pebbles, which would be 
severe on the already tender feet. About ten miles distant, 
in the direction of their advance, were the waters of the 
Red Sea. The night's rest at Etham had been much needed; 
and yet in the morning they did not feel thoroughly re- 
freshed. Almost all of them were on foot, and any one 
who has tried pedestrian journeying, knows that on the 
second morning the system, not yet accustomed to the severe 
strain upon it feels the exhaustion more than at any other 
time. Foot-sore and jaded, they had little disposition to 
answer fresh calls for effort. 

But the call was made. In the early day, the conducting 
cloud began again to move. During the night the pillar 
of fire had rested over them, — a quiet, bright assurance, it 
seemed to them to be, that Ood was with them: in the morn- 
ing light it had faded and changed to cloud, and the cloud 
was now again leading on. 

But whither? The more intelligent of the Israelites 
knew that it was conducting them directly toward a spot 



THE EXODUS, 319 

where nature was opposing to them a seeming impossibility 
of advance. And then, — what if the Egyptians should 
come behind ? 

Still they were conducted on directly toward the sea. 

The day^s journey was a very toilsome one ; — not very 
long, being only ten or twelve miles ; but the small rounded 
stones wounded the feet, and the vast company were feeling 
greatly the exhaustion from the previous excitement and 
the fatigues of the way. Heart- weary they were, as well as 
weary in their limbs ; for they were missing the comforts in 
their Egyptian life, which, it was true, had not been many, 
but were still greater than here. Liberty, so joyous at the 
outset, had to be purchased with suffering : " Was the suffer- 
ing,^^ some of them murmured, ^^ greater even in Egypt than 
now?^^ Before them, too, were such uncertainties, perhaps far 
greater trials than they were now enduring ; moroseness and 
gloom were already beginning to take, in some, the place of 

joy- 
Still on, over that dreary, flat desert they marched through 

the whole day ; for the cloud was still moving on. Some 
distance on their right was a range of lofty mountains, but 
it afforded little relief to the eye ; for the mountains were 
quite bare like the desert, and the sun fell upon them, as it 
did on the level ground, in a fiery glare. The vast pillar 
of cloud, it is true, was shading the Israelites;^ but all 
around them nature seemed to be roavSted and burnt up in 
this furnace, where they themselves, even with the help of 
this shade, were panting for breath. All at once, however, 
arose the cry of " The sea !" " The sea V^ and every one 
pressed on toward the sight, which was, to their eyes, a most 
welcome relief. But the more thoughtful were greatly per- 
plexed. For, if the Egyptians should pursue them, they 
would now be hemmed in ; — on the south by the rugged moun- 



1 See Ps. cv. 39 : also 1 Cor. x. 1, 2. 



320 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT, 

tain which projected close up to the water, leaving no place for 
their vast host to pass in its front ; — on the east by the waters 
of the gulf; and on the west and north by their enemy. 

The cloud rested now as they drew near to the water, and 
the divine admonition instructed Moses, "Speak unto the 
children of Israel, that they turn and encamp before Pi-hahi- 
roth, between Migdol and the sea, over against Baal-zephon : 
before it shall ye encamp by the sea :'^ to which was added 
the information that they would be pursued, and that here a 
final and signal deliverance would be wrought. 

So they encamped, the great multitude glad of the rest 
to their bodies, and yet in their minds uneasy : for to all it 
was obvious that there was at least embarassment in their 
present position ; and so there were many doubts and many 
fears. Thus the approaching gloom of evening was not 
needed to bring what was already there — gloom upon the 
heart. Yet in the midst of all this, and in strong contrast 
with it, was the enjoyment of the young and thoughtless in 
this novelty of the place ; — the long stretch of water gleam- 
ing in the setting sun, the bright pebbles and shells on the 
beach, and the coral for which the shores of the Red Sea are 
celebrated to this day. So the scene at this evening's en- 
campment was one made up of striking opposites; enjoyment 
of rest by the old, and of activity and excitement by the 
young; hopes, — for beyond tliis sea there would be greater 
safety ; and fears, — for its waters were a seemingly impas- 
sable obstacle before them ; in some, despondency ; trust in 
Bome. 

All were suddenly roused by a cry that the Egyptians were 
coming! and presently, in the for distance, flashing the 
rays of the now setting sun, bright armor was to be seen, 
with moving objects on the dim horizon ; and then more 
distinct marks of a large host; and then a great array of 
chariots such as were used in battle, and before which kind 



THE EXODUS, 32 1 

of armament, on a level country like this, resistance must 
be hopeless. 

The gloomy fears which had settled on the hearts of the 
thoughtful among the Israelites were seen to be only too 
well founded. People were filled with despair. The vast 
array of war-chariots — six hundred they actually were in 
number; and the armed horsemen and the foot-soldiers 
stretching far over the plain, showed fully and clearly the 
meaning of this pursuit. It was the whole Egyptian army, 
with Pharaoh at its head. He had roused up at the cry 
from his subjects, " Why have we done this, that we have 
let Israel go from serving us?'^ while, with their selfish feel- 
ing of interest, was mingled an intense wish for vengeance 
upon those for whom their first-born had been slain. 

Over all the encampment of Israel arose a tumultuous 
sound : from some it was a prayer to God ; from far the 
greater part it consisted of objurgations against Moses. To 
him they hastened — 

" Because there were no graves in Egypt, hast thou taken 
us away to die in the wilderness ? AVherefore hast thou 
dealt thus with us, to carry us forth out of Egypt? Is not 
this the word that we did tell thee in Egypt, saying. Let 
us alone, that we may serve the Egyptians ? For it had 
been better for us to serve the Egyptians, than that we 
should die in the wilderness.^^ 

He stood calmly amid this storm of reproaches and in- 
dignation, and replied — 

" Fear ye not, stand still, and see the salvation of the 
Lord, which he will show you to-day : for the Egyptians 
whom ye have seen to-day, ye shall see them again no more 
for ever. The Lord shall fight for you, and ye shall hold 
your peace.^^ 

They gazed wonderingly at him, so calm, so confident in 
his manner, so assuring in his words. They had often 
heard his declarations that the divine power would help, 



322 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT, 

and had witnessed its help. They tried now to trust his 
word, but felt that it required a powerful exercise of faith. 
All knew that the crisis in their life had certainly come. 



CHAPTER XXXIII. 
THE CRISIS: THE DELIVERANCE. 

THE Egyptians thought it best not to make an attack 
that evening. The Israelites were hemmed in and there 
seemed to be no possibility of escape. Resistance might be 
expected from them, for they were desperate men, and could 
muster a force, which, if not well armed, was still formid- 
able by its numbers : in the morning, the war-chariots, the 
steel-clad horsemen, and the vast array of infantry would 
bear down and would carry dismay among them, and have 
an easy victory over such a rabble. Yet there were many 
among the Egyptians whose hearts misgave them ; for what 
were chariots and embattled armies against such a mysteri- 
ous Power as had been fighting for the Hebrews ? Moses 
alone, with such support as that, seemed to be more than all 
Egyptian hosts. Therefore the Egyptians themselves were 
ill at case. — The morning would decide. 

Night came down, enveloping both the multitudes. It 
was not a night of darkness, however, to the Israelites, for 
to their great surprise the pillar of cloud which had rested 
before them, moved to their rear, and cast a brightness upon 
them, while, as their scouts on the edge of their encamp- 
ment might perceive, it cast a thick darkness over the en- 
campment of their enemy. The Egyptians, too, saw that 
the sky was shut out from them — the unusual blackness 
above and around reminding them of the thick night of 



THE CRISIS: THE DELIVERANCE. 



323 



Map from the Crossing of the Red Sea to Sinai. 




||l9 



1. Wady Tawarik. 

2. Jebel Atakah. 

3. Suez. 

4. Ain Naba. 

5. Ain Musa. 

6. Ain Hawarah, supposed to 

be " Mar ah." 

7. Supposed to be " Elim." 

8. Wady Useit. 

9. Jebel Hiimmam. 

10. Wady Shubeikeh. 

11. Wady Taiyibeh and En- 

campment by the Sea. 

12. Encampment where man- 

na was given. 

13. Wady Shellal. 

14. Wady Mukatteb. 

15. Wady Feiran, the black 

line showing the present 
flow of water. 

16. Mount Serbal. 

17. Wady Sheikh. 

18. Supposed by Robinson to 

be Rephidim. 

19 Sinai. 

20. Easier way to Sinai from 
the Sands. 

A. A. Sandy shore, supposed 
by Robinson to be the 
Wilderness of Sin, Ex. 
xvi. 1. Of these wadys, 
only Feiran has a con- 
stant stream ; the others 
are dry except after 
heavy rains. 



6 10 15 20 English mUes. 



324 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

three days preceding the destruction of their first-born. 
The blackness seemed to creep through their whole system, 
and they rested in fear. 

No rest among the Israelites. They had been forewarned 
to be ready for moving ; and then when the night had fully 
set in, they were put in motion directly toward the water. 
An east wind like a hurricane had arisen and was blowing 
directly against them and upon the sea, as they struggled 
down to the shore; but no wind, even with the violence 
with which this came sweeping down over the head of the 
gulf, could make such a change as they saw now in de- 
scending to what in the evening had been that broad space 
of water. The strong light from the mysterious cloud 
showed that what had, on their arrival, been covered by the 
sea, had become a bare and loaterless bed ! On their right 
hand and on their left, the water was piled up like a wall ; 
before them was an open highway of dry land for their 
passage ; and the cloud-light gleamed over it all and on the 
shores on the opposite side, inviting them over to what 
seemed to be a place of safety. 

On they went, the vast multitudes, wondering, thankful, 
joyful, hastening with certainty of footstep ; for the cloud- 
light showed every inequality in the ground : onward, till 
they ascended on the Arabian side, and spread along the 
shores ; the foremost looking back over the crowds of men 
and women and children and cattle still pouring over, along 
that safe, dry way, with the water still j)iled up like a wall 
on the right hand and on the left. More like a dream it 
seemed than a reality ; and people cleared their eyes and 
felt each other, and talked, to assure themselves that it was, 
indeed, a reality. 

The last one of the vast multitude had at length passed 
over. An agitating time it had been, even to the foremost, 
who had soon been able to gain the opposite shore ; more 
agitating still to those who were in the rear. But even the 



THE CRISIS: THE DELIVERANCE, 325 

rearmost crowds were safe now, the cattle also secure ; and 
the eye, now looking backward, saw only an empty space, — 
the waters of the sea still kept back. 

But that space was not empty long. The enemy's scouts 
had, even in the thick darkness around them, become 
aware at length that the Israelites were escaping ; and the 
Egyptian hosts had been roused up and put in order for 
warlike pursuit. They came rushing on ; perceived the 
open way across the channel, and entered upon it with all 
the fierceness of men determined not to be robbed of success 
which they had just deemed so certain. It was the morning 
watch (two o'clock) when the chariots and horsemen and 
foot-soldiers reached the mid-channel, where the chariots in 
front soon began to impede the way, their wheels dragging 
heavily, sinking and loosened in this strange road already 
rendered heavy by the many thousand feet preceding them. 
A supernatural power seemed presently to be at work there. 
They felt it ; they turned to retreat, for the cry of alarm 
was spreading among them,— 

^^ Let us flee from the face of Israel ; for the Lord fighteth 
for them against the Egyptians.'' 

So they were crying to each other and the whole host 
turned to fly. It was too late. Moses, whose rod, when 
stretched out over the sea, on the previous evening, had caused 
the waters to divide as we have seen, \vas now on the Ara- 
bian shore looking down, in the earliest morning light, on 
this confused scene of chariots and soldiers ; and was super- 
naturally directed to stretch out the rod again. He did so. 
The waters rushed together and the whole Egyptian host 
was swallowed up in their depths : " there remained not so 
much as one of them." 

The day broke fully at last and shone upon the usual 
scene of a far outstretched waste of waters, — now the silent 
tomb of that vast host, all buried there except some corpses 
which floated up and were cast, unsightly masses, on either 

28 



326 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

shore. On the Arabian side were scattered widely the res- 
cued Israelites, looking with curiosity over the new scenes 
about them, and with feelings of gratitude up toward Jeho- 
vah, who had come so wonderfully to their deliverance. 
Moses called them together for a hymn of thanksgiving ; 
and we have the triumphant words chanted by him and the 
multitudes: 

" I will sing unto the Lord, for he hath triumphed glori- 
ously,^^ etc., the whole of it a grand hymn of praise and 
terminating as with a chorus, "The Lord shall reign for 
ever and ever.^^ 

His sister Miriam then took a timbrel;^ and other 
women with similar musical imstruments following, they 
showed their joy w^ith music, and with dances such as were 
used in their solemn feasts. Their tones, as they rose up in 
the bright morning air, took that rich and full gladness and 
tenderness \vhich are known only in the female voice ; and 
all nature around seemed to respond as they chanted in her 
brother's words, " Sing ye to the Lord, for he hath triumphed 
gloriously,'' words which are so happily represented in a 
modern lyric that we may properly quote it here : 

" Sound the loud timbrel o'er Egypt's dark sea ! 
Jehovah has triumphed, — his people are free. 

" Sing, — for the pride of the tyrant is broken, 

His chariots, his horsemen, all splendid and brave — 

How vain was their boasting ! — The Lord hath but spoken, 

And chariots and horsemen are sunk in the wave. * 

Sound the loud timbrel o'er Egypt's dark sea ! 

Jehovah has triumphed, — his people are free. 



* The timbrel was doubtless such as we still see on the Egyptian raonu- 
mentfl. It re^^embled the tambourine of modern times, except that it was 
without the hollowed pieces of metal now attached to the frame. It was cir- 
cular or oblong ; in the latter c^ise was sometimes in two parts, separated 
by a cross-bar. "It was," says Wilkinson, respecting the Egyptians, "a 
favorite instrument in religious ceremonies and at private banquets. It 
was played by men and women, more usuallv l.v iho latter, who often wuig 
and danced to ita sound." 



THE CRISIS: THE DELIVERANCE. 327 

" Praise to the Conqueror, praise to the Lord ! 
His word was our arrow, — his breath was our sword I 

" Who shall return to tell Egypt the story 

Of those she sent forth in the hour of her pride ? 

For the Lord hath looked out from his pillar of glory, 
And all her brave thousands are dashed in the tide. 

Sound the loud timbrel o^er Egypt^s dark sea ! 

Jehovah has triumphed, — his people are free." 

The place of this crossing cannot now be ascertained 
with full certainty ; and the subject has given rise to much 
discussion among travellers and critics. The accompanying 
map will show the present outline of the water ; but there 
is reason to suppose that the drifting of the desert sands has 
made changes to the northward of Suez (No. 3 on the map), 
nearly or quite filling up spaces that were covered with 
water in those ancient times. Some travellers have selected 
this place now filled up as that of the crossing : some, on 
the other hand, have decided in favor of the Wady Tawarik 
(No. 1 on map), fifteen miles south of Suez, as the spot for 
that evening^s encampment and the one whence they made 
their transit across the gulf, which is here, at the least, 
twelve miles wide, and could not then have been less. 
Robinson supposes that the encampment was adjoining the 
present city of Suez, and that the crossing was just below 
this city, the water here being three or four miles in width, 
according to the state of the tide. The difference between 
high and low tide is six or seven feet. At the projecting 
point below the city commences a sand-bar which stretches 
to the other side, and in low tides makes a fording place, 
not considered, however, a safe one. In 1799, Bonaparte 
attempted it in the gathering twilight, but the rising tide 
coming with greater rapidity than was expected, he and his 
suite were exposed to great danger, although they had 
guides well acquainted with the spot. The circumstance of 
the bar is, however, now mentioned merely as one of the 



328 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT, 

geographical facts of the place; for such a bar was not 
needed in the crossing by the Israelites ; nor, any more, was 
it necessary that the united influence of the east wind and 
an ebb tide should have laid all the channel bare, — the 
hypothesis of some writers on this subject. On the con- 
trary, we are informed that the water "was a wall unto 
them on their right hand and on the left." 

As respects the place of crossing there are two circum- 
stances which must govern our conclusions, and which 
appear to decide pretty clearly in favor of this spot imme- 
diately adjoining Suez on the south: 1. The width must 
have been so restricted that the whole of the Israelite host, 
two and a half million or more in number, with their flocks 
could cross between the beginning of darkness and two 
o'clock A. M. (Ex. xiv. 24) : and 2. It must have been 
wide enough to contain at once all the Egyptain host, — the 
six hundred chariots, &c. For this latter, the narrow space 
of water supposed formerly to exist north of the present 
head of the gulf would not have sufficed ; and for the 
former, the wide space of ten or twelve miles, opposite 
Wady Tawarik would have been quite too great, — a day's 
journey indeed for such a confused host even with the 
aid of sunlight. The last of the Israelites to enter would 
be more than an hour after the first, and would require 
nearly two hours to cross a distance of four miles, which 
with their flocks in addition, would occupy the full time to 
two o'clock. The spot selected by Dr. Robinson appears 
therefore to answer, and to be the only one that will answer, 
to all the requisites in the case. 



THE ADVANCE. 329 



CHAPTER XXXIV. 
THE ADVANCE, 

THE minds of the Israelites had risen with a great 
rebound from the pressure upon them during recent 
events. Their first utterances had been in lofty hymns^ in 
great rejoicings and general congratulations, and in deep 
gratitude to God : then the people turned to a deliberate 
contemplation of the scene around them and of the future. 

The scene in all its natural aspects was sufficiently 
dreary. On the west was the gloomy Mount Atakah^ (No. 
2 on map), which, naked and burnt by the sun, bounded on 
the south \h!Q level plain they had on the previous day been 
traversing. Still nearer, in that direction, was the sea bor- 
dered by no vegetation, but only by dead bodies already 
swollen and festering in the intense heat. Northwardly, 
was an open gloomy desert, over which, far off and separated 
in the whole distance by a barren desert, was Canaan. 
Eastwardly, was first a bare and gravelly plain, and then, 
at the distance of fifteen miles, the wall-like ridge of er- 
Rahah, 4000 feet high, broken in its level sky-line by only a 
single peak at the south-east, — the peak and ridge alike bare 
and desolate-looking. On the south was a succession of low, 
barren sandhills bordered by the sea, which stretched off as 
far as their sight could extend. 

But their hearts were joyous notwithstanding the gloomy 
sights all around them ; for they were free and loere safe. 
The cloud also was still resting above them, giving them 
assurance of the continued Divine presence : it added also its 
friendly shelter from the burning heat of the sun. After 
a while, it began to move, exciting hopes in them that they 



We adopt the modern names through want of other designations. 

28* 



330 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

might be conducted on to pleasanter scenes than those im- 
mediately in sight. At a spot nearly opposite to that where 
we suppose them to have crossed the sea, and three miles 
inland, is now a fountain called Ain Naba (No. 4 on map), 
in which the water boils up continually, giving sufficient for 
two hundred camel-loads at once;^ the water brackish, 
but still, until recently, the main dependence of Suez for 
such supplies. Then, going southwardly, we traverse a 
slight and very gradual ascent ; and at the distance of three 
miles, reach a steep descent, from the brow of which opens a 
wide view of the sea on the right, and just before us, of a 
low plain on which a few stunted palm trees mark the site 
of ^m MUsa (No. 5), or '' the fountain of Moses,'^ about two 
miles distant. Here are seven fountains, the water dark 
colored and brackish, and depositing a hard substance, so 
that mounds have been formed, on the top of which the 
water flows out. It is soon lost in the plain, but gives 
moisture enough to sustain about twenty palm-trees or 
rather palm-bushes, and a scant supply of barley and 
vegetables. 

The Israelites in their anticipation of a journey into the 
wilderness had supplied themselves with flour ; and these 
fountains of Ain Naba and Ain 3Iilsa probably then existed, 
and for the present afforded them water. The wrecks of the 
Egyptian army strewn along the shore doubtless also gave 
them some arms for their 600,000 men, forming " the host^' 
of their camp. 

But this great assemblage of nearly three millions of 
people was little more than a rabble, thus far held together 
by fear and by the common concentrated interest in the 
escape. Now, fear was gone and the escape was secured ; 
and the distinct, individualized passions began to rise up 
and take rule in each breast. Moses had indeed a task 



KoblDson. 



THE ADVANCE, . 33 1 

before him, the hardest that could be laid on any human 
being. For they were a very debased and very ignorant set 
of people whom he was now to organize and subject to law ; 
and this, without any authority over them except what 
could be drawn from recent acts and their own sense of in- 
terest. Trustful as he was in the divine power, he might well 
be appalled at the duty laid on him, — the immense task 
of bringing order out of such confusion as was presenting 
itself, and of making consistent the loose, incoherent materials 
of which this vast company was composed. Under any cir- 
cumstances of ease and comfort and permanency, this would 
have been a stupendous undertaking, especially as it had to 
be done at once ; but here, the company was a moving one, 
straggling along ; and they must quickly encounter sufferings 
in which impatience and all other bad passions would be 
engendered. Moreover, Avhat a frightful desert was this all 
around them, compared with the fruitful, well- watered 
plains which they had just left in Egypt, — the abundance 
of grain and grass and fruits, and of fish in the rivers and 
canals. They might soon be expected to cast longing eyes 
behind them : the bitterness of their servitude would 
quickly be forgotten in the greater suffering from present 
want; and then, all semblance of authority being lost, the 
whole scene might become a frightful struggle of individual 
passions and necessities. So debased were they and so lost 
even to all religious sentiment, that it would be in vain to 
appeal to reason or religion. In their long, abject servitude 
the passions had been brutalized, as they always are, by 
slavery ; and the religious systems of the Egyptians had so 
obliterated their own ancient traditions respecting God, or 
had become so blended with them, that they scarcely knew 
in what they believed or might believe. Our own eyes, in 
our land, have seen some of the grossly debasing effects of 
slavery ; but with us it had still had the renovating and pu- 
rifying influences of Christianity. Take from such slavery 



332 d^IFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT, 

religion and God, and put around it, as publicly honored 
things, the worship of beasts and of Venus, and we may 
then have some idea of the mental and moral condition of 
the multitudes, who in company w^ith Moses, were now 
straggling along southwardly over the deserts of the Arabian 
peninsula. 

Three days without water ! Such was now the fact. They 
had filled their vessels at the springs near the crossing-place, 
probably forewarned by their leader, who knew to what a 
dried-up, waterless region the pillar of cloud was conduct- 
ing them. But this supply among such a people would 
very soon be exhausted. The vessels became empty, 
and the whole people soon were panting and the children 
crying from extreme thirst. Moses and Aaron, who were 
acquainted with this route, must have looked with awe and 
with many strangely mingled feelings at that cloud conduct- 
ing onward the palpitating and already gasping company, 
over the long, sun-scorched wastes before them ; and they 
knew also that the water in the nearest fountain, three days 
ahead from the last, was bitter and not drinkable. So they 
looked wonderingly, and with awe, at that conducting cloud 
still moving on. It led : they followed, believing, and yet 
with many strange queryings in their minds respecting the 
coming results. One result had come already, and was all 
around them ; — murmurs, doubts, rising anger, the begin- 
nings of what was almost an imprecation on themselves. 

This region is so little subject to changes that we may 
consider it as having been then nearly or quite as it is now. 
First, immediately south of those fountains of Ain Naba 
and Ain Musa, is a succession of low sandhills; then, a 
gravelly track many miles in extent, crossed at intervals 
from east to west, with slight depressions (shallow wadys), 
having in thorn a few scattered herbs and shrubs, and a few 
scattering rocks of coral formation, with sand-drift« every- 
where formed around opposing obstacles: on the left, still the 



THE ADVANCE, 333 

bare, gloomy face of the ridge er Rahah ; and on the west, 
the sea, and beyond it the bare ridges of the parallel moun- 
tain ranges Atakah and Kulalah. 

For two days the company dragged themselves along 
over the hard surface of these level, gravelly tracts and the 
shallow depressions and drifts of sand ; their hearts, not- 
withstanding the new freedom, beginning to take the melan- 
choly aspect of everything around them, and their bodies 
parched with thirst. On the third morning they entered 
among hills, or banks of sand and pebbles, succeeded pres- 
ently by hills of limestone blackened with flint; and, winding 
among these, the view had varied, at last, by a lofty isolated 
mountain, Jebel Hiimmam, by the sea-side. But although of 
a picturesque outline, the mountain was ^' black and desolate :'^ 
indeed, by this time, the whole company had little heart to ob- 
serve anything ; for they had only one sensation, — a burning, 
consuming thirst. Their thoughts were continually turning 
back to the Nile shores, where the waters are so proverbially 
delicious. And now, as those weary people went palpita- 
ting among the hills, where gray rock was varied only by 
black flint, or in the shallows by drift sand, many of them 
were ready to barter freedom for a single long draught ; for 
they were on the point of perishing from thirst. 

It was then, with indescribable joy, that they heard the 
cry at last, repeated and spread swiftly over all the com- 
pany, that water had been reached. All hurried forward, 
the laggards crowding against the foremost ; and all were 
rejoiced when on reaching the edge of a narrow depression 
they saw in its bottom scattered green shrubs, the evidence 
that water was there. They rushed down to drink ; — the 
whole company raised a loud cry of despair and horror; — 

THE WATER WAS BITTER ! 

It was doubtless at the same sj)ot where the fountain 
Hawarah (No. 6 on the map) still exists, distant exactly 
three days' journey southwardly from Ain Miisa ; the Siime 



334 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

fountainless region still lying between the two. The foun- 
tain is in a basin six or eight feet in diameter, on the sum- 
mit of a large mound composed of a whitish rocky substance 
formed apparently by deposits from the water, which is 
about two feet deep. " Its taste/^ says Robinson, " is un- 
pleasant, saltish, and somewhat bitter; but we could not 
perceive that it was very much worse than that of ^Ayun 
Musa [Ain Musa] ; perhaps because we were not yet con- 
noisseurs in bad water. The Arabs, however, pronounce it 
bitter, and consider it as the worst water in all these 
regions.^^^ 

Among the Israelites rose up a universal moan of hor- 
ror and dismay; for they were perishing; — the children, 
and old people, and middle-aged, all equally showing parched 
lips, and features expressive of intense suffering. Their 
disappointment was turning into a fury of indignation 
toward Moses, and was beginning to vent itself in audible 
sounds against him : but he needed no such demonstrations, 
for no heart among them was more filled with grief than 
was his. God was the only hope, and the leader was direct- 
ing earnest cries to him. Nor cried in vain ; for the divine 
influence directed him to a tree, and gave chemical powers 
to a branch of this when cast into the waters, so that they 
became pleasant to the taste. God there also, through their 
leader, entered into a covenant with the people, promising 
them bodily health if they would "give ear to his com- 
mandments and keep all his statutes.^^ But it seemed indeed 
as if statutes and covenants would avail little, and that 
there was a necessity for miraculous powers upon heart and 
mind, in a peoi>lc so ignorant and so debased as were these 
late abject slaves of despotic and superstitious masters in 
Egypt. 

From this onward, the progress of the Israelites was more 



* Dr. Olin says it resembled to him " a weak solution of Epsom salts." 



THE ADVANCE, 335 

diversified. The road, soon after leaving this Wady el 
^Amfi,rah, passes by a small basin of some fertility, where 
wheat and barley are raised; and, at the distance of 
six miles, comes to Wady Ghiiriindel (No. 7), a broad val- 
ley coming from the mountains on the left and running 
down to the sea. It strikes most pleasantly on the eye, on 
account of its verdure, ^^its straggling trees of several 
kinds,^^ amongst them a species of tamarisk and mimosa, 
also a few palm trees raising their stunted forms. Proceed- 
ing to the right, down the wady, we come in half an hour 
to a spring bursting out at the foot of a sandstone rock, and 
forming a pool of clear water, bordered by sedges. There 
also, says Bartlett, in describing his visit to this place, ^^was 
even, delightful sight ! a little grass, and birds were hop- 
ping about enjoying the rare luxury. The water, trickling 
off, pursues its way some distance down the valley, forming 
a reedy marsh, interspersed with thickets of bushes and 
dwarf palm trees, and a considerable quantity of tamarisk, 
with other shrubs ; . . . . and, as there are also consider- 
able masses of similar vegetation above this point, there are 
probably several other springs which nourish it.^' 

This place is almost universally conceded to be the '^ Elim 
where the Israelites found twelve wells of water, and three- 
score and ten palm trees,^^ and where they encamped " by 
the waters f^ and here they probably remained several 
days.^ It was only about eight miles from Marah ; but the 
next advance march was to be a long one, and the pleas- 
antness of the spot and the abundance of water would 
make the delay agreeable. When a day's journey is spoken 
of, we are doubtless to understand it to be that of their 
leaders ; for the whole company was so large, and would be 
so given to straggling, that we can scarcely consider them 
as a compact body in their advance, except so far as would be 



^ Ex. XV. 27. 2 Inference from the time given in Ex. xvi. 1. 



336 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

produced by their desire to follow closely the leadership of 
the pillar of cloud, and to keep under its friendly shelter 
from the sun. 

But the cloud finally began to move, and the encampment 
at Elim was broken up. The refreshment of this rest was 
indeed necessary ; for here a more mountainous tract com- 
menced. Their course is yet kept quite distinctly before us 
in consequence of the formation of the ground, and by hints 
in the Sacred Record. Leaving these wells it ascended a 
low ridge between Wady Ghiirundel and Wady Useit, and 
gaining this height commanded an extensive view, embracing 
the lofty, precipitous Jebel Hiimmam (No. 9), now close 
adjoining on the south-west. On the east is a continuation 
of the heights of er Rahah, but in this part taking the 
name of Et-Tih. Southwardly, out of a sea of lower hills 
rise the grand heights of Serbal, the first one of the bare 
and rough granitic mountains of the peninsula, which are 
characterized not unaptly as " the Alps unclothed.^^ Then 
the way descends into Wady Useit (No. 8), resembling 
Ghiirundel, but not so large, and with small palm trees and 
some water; then it passes over another ridge to Wady 
Thai, and then over another to Wady Shubeikeh (No. 10), 
which it follows for a short distance in a southerly di- 
rection. This last is then joined by another wady ; and to- 
gether they have the name of Wady Taiyibeh (No. 11), 
which takes its course in a westerly direction to the sea, 
four miles distant. This latter wady is described as " a fine 
valley, enclosed with abrupt rocks, with many trees and a 
little brackish water like the preceding wadys.^^ Where it 
reaches the sea, there is a high promontory on the north; 
while on the south the mountains retire for a short distance, 
leaving a sandy plain with many shrubs extending for 
about three miles along the shore. This course which we 
have just been tracing, was the one followed by the Israel- 
ites after leaving Elim, eighteen miles distant, a long day^s 



THE ADVANCE, 337 

journey for such a company, but one which they could well 
perform after their sufficient rest at that place : ^^ They re- 
moved from Elim/^ we are told, and encamped by the Red 
Sea.^ They were now beginning to be hemmed in by the 
mountains,: for even Wady Taiyibeh is described by a 
traveller as lined by ^^ stern and bold" heights, which give 
it somewhat of a rude grandeur ; and here by the sea they 
had on the south a lofty, projecting headland, admitting a 
passage only at low water, or across its rough escarpments. 
But they passed this ; and then they had before them by 
the shore a sandy plain, from two to four miles wide, and 
extending, with slight interruptions, to the extremity of the 
peninsula, one hundred miles distant. Robinson considers 
this long plain as " the Desert of Sin.^ 

Their first camping-place (No. 12 on the map) on this 
sandy plain, was to be to the Israelites a most memorable 
spot. They had now been a month^ away from Egypt, and 
their provisions were beginning entirely to fail. In their 
hurried departure they had laid in such a store of flour as 
came within their means ; and their flocks had on the way 
supplied them with meat and a scant quantity of milk ; 
and their previous habits in the land of servitude had accus- 
tomed them to do without luxuries. But flour was giving 
out, and flocks were perishing amid this meagre herbage, 
and a time of starvation seemed to be fast coming upon this 
immense host. We can see them, in these last days^ jo^^- 
neyings, dragging themselves reluctantly along in this 
further and further penetration among the mountains which 
seemed to be opening their recesses only thus to provide 
them with ready graves. That mysterious cloud was still 
leading them on: — they often asked themselves. Whither? 
To what ? It had lost its novelty ; and some were even be- 
ginning to doubt its friendliness. Its mystery, — the vapory 



1 Num. xxxiii. 10. ^ gee Ex. xvi. 1: Num. xxxiii. 11. ^ Ex. xvi. 1. 



33^ LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT, 

pillar by day, the pillar of fire by night, — the mystery ever 
present and visible, was almost sitting like an oppression on 
their souls. Ever present, as if watching them, — what was 
it? A spirit? Good? or bad? It was leading them, some 
of them thought, as if it might be to their doom? It was 
an oppression on their untrained, ignorant souls. And this 
man, Moses, a mystery too ! with whom, or with what, was 
he leagued? and for what? Ignorant and debased these 
people were, and they reasoned blindly and corruptly. The 
whole multitude were going on in a kind of maze. Just at 
this time even wiser and better men might well have been 
lost in a labyrinth of queryinojs. 

For famine was staring them in the face. This fact every 
one's convictions showed him in their empty meal-bags and 
their diminished and still diminishing herds. So, as they 
followed down that rock-hemmed ravine of Wady Taiyibeh, 
and afterward straggled over the jutting sea-girt promon- 
tory, and then saw only this long, desolate-looking, sandy 
plain, with the bare sea on one side of it, and the equally 
bare granite crags on the other, — everywhere only desola- 
tion, — they broke out into words, and let their pent-up 
feelings have vent. The storm of invective of course fell 
upon Moses and Aaron. The other rulers, if they did not 
join in it, seem to have interposed no word. 

" Would to God,^' the people cried, " we had died by the 
hand of the Lord in the land of Egypt, when we sat by the 
flcsli-))ots and when we did oat bread to the full : for ye 
have brought us forth into this wilderness to kill \\\o whole 
assembly with hunger.'' 

God, however, was the sure helper of all. He told their 
leaders, 

** I will rain bread from heaven for you ;'' and directed 
how it was to be gathered. A double supply was to be 
afforded on the sixth day of the week, so that a portion 



THE ADVANCE, 339 

might be saved for the seventh, and thus the sanctity of the 
Sabbath be preserved. 

This promise of supply of food was announced to the 
people by Moses, who added, " What are we? Your mur- 
murings are not against us, but against the Lord /^ and he 
directed Aaron to call upon them, 

'' Come near before the Lord : for he hath heard your 
murmurings/' As Aaron did so, the people gazed "toward 
the wilderness, and behold, the glory of the Lord appeared 
in the cloud.'^ To individuals such as they were, demon- 
strations of this kind, directed to their outward senses, were 
to be the books for them to read. The change to be wrought 
in this immense multitude of ignorant people, so debased by 
slavery, can scarcely be conceived by us in our times of en- 
lightenment. What knowledge had they ? what means for 
knowledge, except what came to them through their senses ? 
And yet they were a people who were to be lifted, as soon as 
possible, into the highest of all sciences, the science of God. 

That evening, while many queries as to what was coming 
were filling their minds, and while all felt that an imme- 
diate, pressing need was upon them, flocks of quails came 
darkening the air and filled the camps. They were a bird 
well known in the country,^ but all saw that it was a mi- 
raculous, as it was indeed a most welcome and a needed 
supply. 

But there was to be something more than this. Moses 
had declared to them, on the authority of Jehovah, " At 
even ye shall eat flesh, and in the morning ye shall be filled 

^ Bartlett, in his explorations of this region says, " We saw here numer- 
ous desert partridges, or ^ quails,' of which a miraculous supply was afforded 
to the Israelites on this very spot." The Oriental quail resembles the 
American partridge in size and appearance. These birds are stated by 
Hasselquist to be sometimes abundant near the Dead Sea and in Arabia ; 
and Burckhardt saw them in large numbers south of the Dead Sea. In 
the present case, as in others already noticed, the miracle consisted in a 
special and extraordinary use of common means. 



340 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

with bread : and ye shall know that I am the Lord your 
God.'^ The whole immense company had now had a 
sufficient meal, and were in the pleasant, satisfactory con- 
dition of people in whom a ravenous appetite has been 
fully gratified. But in the morning they were to have a full 
sufficiency of bread also ; and many queries were started 
among them, and many conjectures hazarded, as to the man- 
ner in which it would appear. So they lay down that night 
in a truly comfortable state for the present, but impatient 
for the morrow to bring its solution to their questions re- 
specting the other new supply. The silence by night in 
those deserts of Arabia is so profound that it is said by 
travellers that they can hear their own hearts beating there. 
Eastward of the camp were those solemn old mountains, 
teaching evermore a lesson of strength and firmness and 
deep repose. On the west was the sea, an unbroken level, 
far outspread. Above them shone now, as always, that mys- 
terious pillar of light in its strange, solitary companionship 
with them, alone in its brightness though many stars were 
glittering far above. Through the night, a dew descended 
upon the camp ; and watchers there might have noticed, 
also gently and quietly descending, a small substance of a 
singular and unknown character, which before morning 
formed a perceptible stratum upon the ground. 

When people waked up in the early dawn their eyes were 
greeted by this wonderful sight. Moses spoke to them, 
" This is the bread which the Lord hath given you to eat.'^ 

The substance was in small, white grains, of the size of 
coriander seed, hard and pleasant to the taste. As the dew 
exhaled they gathered it into heaps, and found that it would 
make quite a sufficiency of bread for every individual of 
their company. They "ground it in mills, or beat it in a 
mortar, and baked it in pans, and made cakes of it ; and 
the taste of it was as the taste of fresh oil."^ In another 

» Num. xi. 8. 



THE ADVANCE, 341 

place we are informed that " the taste of it was like wafers 
made with honey.'^ ^ They called it Manna? 

According to the direction of Moses, they were to gather 
it at the rate of an omer (a little more than five pints, or 
more precisely five and one-tenth pints) for every indi- 
vidual ; and no attempt was to be made to lay it up in store 
for the next day, except on the sixth ; each morning would 
furnish its own supply, except the latter, which was to give 
a double quantity, so that there need be no gathering on the 
seventh or the Sabbath.^ On the sixth they were not only 
to gather but to bake for the following day. During the 
earlier part of the day, as the heat of the sun increased, the 
substance melted and disappeared. Some of the people dis- 
regarded the direction of their leader not to store any away, 
but to depend on a daily supply from heaven ; and fearful 



» Ex. xvi. 31. 

2 The original in Ex. xvi. 15, is j^in |D : and if we give to the latter word 
its meaning in times long subsequent to this, the two will ^\%mij what thi^f 
Commentators therefore generally attribute the name manna to an excla- 
mation by the wondering and querying multitude. But this use of m 
{man) who or what, occurs only in Chaldaic, and is not found till the times 
of Ezra and Daniel. (See Ezra v. 3, 4, 9 ; Dan. iii. 15.) Such explana- 
tion of commentators seems therefore to be unauthorized and indeed 
appears, at first sight, to be fanciful. Perhaps it is best not to attempt any, 
but to take the word simply as it is. 

At the present day a gum found in that country is sold to visitors under 
the name of Manna. It is found on the twigs and branches of a tamarisk 
shrub, {Tamarix Gallica mannifera)^ from which it exudes in consequence 
of the puncture of an insect of the Coccus kind {Coccus manniparus). "It 
has," says Robinson, " the appearance of gum, is of a sweetish taste and 
melts when exposed to the sun or to a fire. The Arabs consider it a great 
delicacy and the pilgrims prize it highly." It is said not to be procured 
every year, sometimes only after five or six years. It can be preserved 
by boiling, and is sold at from four to five dollars the pound. Except in 
name and partly in taste, it of course bears no analogy to the manna 
afforded to the Israelites. 

^ Here we have the institution of the Sabbath before the Decalogue was 
given. 

29 -^ » 



342 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

probably for the future, attempted to accumulate ; but what 
they laid by became wormy and offensive before the next morn- 
ing. On the seventh day, some also went out for a gather- 
ing; but they found none, and received a Divine reprimand 
through Moses for their disregard of the heavenly ordin- 
ance for the observance of this day. It is worthy of note 
here, how upon these ignorant and obtuse people, moral com- 
mands had to be laid through their senses, as well as by 
words directed to their reason. 

It has been estimated that the omer per day would amount 
to about 15,000,000 pounds for each week. During the 
forty years of their wanderings in the wilderness, the sup- 
ply never failed. The vastness of the miracle sometimes 
startles the readers of God's Book: but why? It was just 
as easy for God to send the manna upon the camp as to 
send the dew. The latter comes to us by what we call 
natural causes, that is, by evaporation through heat, and 
next by condensation through cold. But what is heat? 
how caused? whence its original source? We come here 
at once into the inexplicable ; and the case of manna presents 
us only one or two links shorter than that of the other. 
Then again, as to our usual supply of food : how does grain 
grow ? Why does it give its nourishment to us more than do 
stones ? The fact is, that the wisest of men " see through a 
glass darkly," and then see but a little way. In the case 
of the Israelites, God was teaching a nation who were to be 
a demonstration for him before the world then, and through 
all subsequent history. He was helping us to see him in 
all nature and in all history ; and he was doing it in the best 
way for them and us, and especially in a way best suited to 
act on their dark minds, not given to deductions from reason, 
but to judging by the senses. We cavil most unreasonably 
when we do so about the extent or the minuteness of a mira- 
cle. Vast or small, both are alike to him, and are as easy also 
to him as are the operations of what we call natural laws. 



TOWARD SINAI, 343 

CHAPTER XXXV. 
TOWARD SINAI, 

THAT mysterious leader and guide, the pillar of cloud 
above their heads, was again in motion. They moved 
with it ; but we are no longer able to trace their course with 
that distinctness which we have hitherto been able to gain. 
We are informed of but three stations between this spot by 
the sea and that at Sinai — namely, at Dophkah, at Alush, 
and Rephidim ;^ and we know that they were a month in 
' making the journey from this encampment to that moun- 
tain :^ as to the position of those intermediate stations we are 
left onlj^ to conjecture, and have scarcely even the means 
for that. 

The nature of the ground would admit of several routes 
after leaving the encampment by the sea, namely, along the 
sandy shore for fifty-five miles to a valley (No. 20 on map), 
where, turning to the left at nearly a right angle, they would 
have a shorter distance among the mountains than by any 
other ; or they could turn immediately by Wady Shellal 
(13), to Wady Mukatteb (14), and so to Feiran; or, at a 
distance of twenty miles along the shore, then at once into 
AVady Feiran (15). The second of these is the shortest, and 
was evidently the most used in the ancient times ; for Wady 
Mukatteb, '^ Written Valley,'^ takes its name from the great 
abundance of what are called Sinaitic inscriptions, here 
crowded on almost every rock, and often at such altitudes as 
almost to require a ladder to reach them. They commence 
here, and are thence scattered thickly along Wady Feiran, 
and, onward, more sparingly to Sinai, and in yet fewer 
numbers about that mountain. 



^ Num. xxxiii. 12-14. ^ Compare Ex. xvi. 1 with ib. xix. 1. 



344 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

The Israelites, it is generally believed, took the route along 
Wady Feiran either by way of its outlet at the sandy shore, 
or through Wady Shellal and Mukatteb. If by Mukatteb, 
they would (supposing the natural scenery to be then as 
now), soon after entering Wady Feiran, come to a spot 
" where,^^ says a recent traveller, " at a turn of the road, the 
scene burst upon us more like the dream of a poet, than 
any reality in this arid wilderness. The cliffs on either 
hand still towered bare and perpendicular, to an immense 
height ; but instead of a gravelly valley, collecting and 
condensing the fiery rays of the* sun, arose, as by enchant- 
ment, tufted groves of palm and fruit trees, producing oa 
my mind a more vivid impression of romantic luxuriance" 
than had been left by anything I had yet seen in the East.'^^ 
Proceeding onward, this rich vegetation almost ceases ; and 
then at the distance of about a mile, we come upon the greatest 
of marvels in that country, '' a stream of running water 
purling through an overhanging covert'^ of trees. '' On the 
edge of this palm-forest," says the same writer, ^^ nature had 
already prepared a halting-place for the lonely and worn 
visitor of her most hidden haunts, and among the infinite 
variety of her fanciful creations, few could be found more 
wild or marvellous than this. . . . The palms beneath 
which I encamped were not the solitary ornament of a small 
oasis; but the outskirts of a dense grove extending for miles 
up the narrow valley. On stei)ping out of my tent, I was 
at once in the midst of an almost tropical wilderness. In 
the palm-groves of Egypt the stems are trimmed and 
straight, and placed generally at regular intervals ; but here 
this most graceful of trees is half untendcd, its boughs spring 
direct from the earth, and form tufts and avenues and dense 
overarching thickets of the most luxuriant growth, through 
which the sunlight falls tremblingly upon the shaded turf. 



* Bartlett's '' Forty Days." 



b 



TOWARD SINAI, 345 

Among them, some few shooting upright, lift high above 
the rest their lovely coronal of rustling fans and glowing 
bunches of dates ; but the greatest part assume that fan- 
tastic variety of form which only untended nature can 
originate; some, wildly ^throwing forth their branches, 
droop to the ground like heavy plumes, laden with a grace- 
ful burden of fanlike boughs which almost kiss the turf; 
others, crossing and intertwined, form mazy alleys of exquisite 
verdure : the clear stream bubbles freshly on the edge of 
these arcades, and the deep solitude is vocal with the song 
of birds ; the wind, sweeping down the rocks, plays over the 
rustling foliage with the gentlest murmur ; and, shut in by 
two lofty walls of rock from the dreary desert without, the 
traveller, lulled in a dreamy and delicious repose, heightened 
by his past weariness, forgets a while its perils and priva- 
tions, and the long distance he has yet to accomplish across 
its drouthy sands/^ 

This small but beautiful valley bears in it marks of hav- 
ing been a place of some, consequence in the ancient times. 
We find here stone walls, the remains of a city and of a 
convent and churches, and in the rocks numerous holes 
either natural or excavated, yet evidently once the abodes 
of anchorites. From the fourth to the eighth century of 
our era. Christian residents and pilgrims were sufficiently 
numerous in this part of Arabia to have a bishop, whosg^ 
home appears to have been at Pharan (Feiran) ; and Theo- 
dorus of this see made himself famous in two Christian 
councils, one at Rome, A. D. 649, and the other at Con- 
stantinople, A. D. 680. The great abundance of Sinaitic 
inscriptions about this place also shows how much it was 
frequented in those early times. 

Three miles southward from this fair, gem-like spot of 
Wady Feiran is Serbal (No. 16), the most northerly of 
the granitic mountains, and the first of them reached by the 
Israelites in their journey. There are higher mountains in 



34^ LIFE-SCEXES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 



the peninsula, but this one, standing so far at one corner of 
the granitic region and quite distant from all the others, has 
a very commanding aspect, and always affects the visitor by 
its majestic grandeur. As stated already it is 6342 feet in 
height above sea-level : it is terminated above by five or six 
conical peaks which form a very picturesque outline marked 
on the sky. All this is very distinct, and as the Israelites 
came journeying on the huge mass excited the wonder and 
admiration of every one, even the most obtuse. Massive, 
yet in its sharp upward peaks airy-like ; solemn, yet pic- 
turesque ; in its singular combination of opposite character- 
istics, it must have drawn every eye by a peculiar attract- 



iveness. 



Map of Mount Serbal and its Vicinity. 
( Copied from Lepsius.) 
11 4 English tnii«>q 




The black line repreeents the present stream in Wady Feiran : the dotted line showi 
Wady Aleyat, giving the meet direct access to Serbal. 

Is this the Sinai of the Scriptures? Writers of great emi- 
nence, I^epsius among them, contend firmly that it is. Robin- 
son, with others also of authority, holds to the contrary; and 
the nature of our subject requires that we now examine the 



TOWARD SINAI. 347 

question. Eminent authorities and tradition also as far as it 
can be reached, appear to be about equally balanced between 
this and the other reputed Sinai — the mountain usually- 
called by this latter name. Probably each place will always 
continue to have its advocates ; but if we take literally the 
requirements in the record of events connected with the 
giving of the Law, there seems to be scarcely room for 
doubt : for the latter and the region adjoining answer fully 
to these requirements, while Serbal and its precincts have no 
such correspondence, but the contrary. 

Every one who, without prejudgment, reads the history 
of the giving of the Law at Sinai, must conclude that all 
the multitudes of the Israelites were near the mountain, and 
in a situation to allow them easily to see it ; also with ready 
[access to it, and where from it they could be easily reached. 
\ Now, Wady Feiran is three miles from the foot of Serbal, 
. and is the only place in this region where the Israelites in a 
body could have encamped. The mountain is reached with 
difficulty from Feiran, by a narrow, rough wady, Aleyat, 
' leading to it from the latter ; is not seen from Feiran except 
at a few spots, and there imperfectly, and consequently could 
not be visible to most of the encampment there ; and the 
grand, solemn impressiveness of the scenes at Sinai w^ould 
I here have been broken up by the difficulties of the inter- 
i vening and surrounding space. We will quote again from 
Bartlett, and we do it the more readily because he seems to 
be very much inclined in favor of Serbal, although his evi- 
dence, which is candidly given, must be admitted to be on 
the other side. He says, speaking of the objection, that 
^^ there is no open space in the immediate neighborhood 
of Serbal suitable for the encampment of the vast multi- 
tude, and from which they could all of them at once have 
had a view of the mountain,^^ " is this objection conclusive ? 
We read, indeed, that Israel ^ camped before the mouniy and 
that ^ the Lord came down in sight of all the people*, more- 



348 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

over, that bounds were set to prevent the people from break- 
ing through and violating even the precincts of the holy soli- 
tude. Although these conditions are more literally fulfilled 
at er-Rahah, [in front of Sinai], yet if we consider them 
couched in general terras, they apply, perhaps, well enough 
to the vicinity of Serbal. A glance at the view and a re- 
ference to this small rough map,^ will show the reader that 
the main encampment of the host must have been in Wady 
Feiran itself, from which the summit of the Serbal is only 
here and there visible, and that it is by the lateral ^vady, 
Aleyat, that the base of the mountain itself, by a walk of 
about an hour, is to be reached. It certainly struck me, in 
passing up this valley, as a very unfit, if not impracticable, 
spot for the encampment of any great number of people, if 
they were all in tents : though well supplied with pure water, 
the ground is rugged and rocky, — toward the base of the 
mountain awfully so; but still it is quite possible that a 
certain number might have established themselves, as the 
Arabs do at present, while, as on other occasions, the princi- 
pal masses were distributed in the surrounding valleys. I 
do not know that there is any adequate ground for believing, 
as Robinson does, that because the people were warned not 
to invade the seclusion of the mount, and a guard was 
placed to prevent them from doing so, that therefore the en- 
campment itself pressed closely on its borders. Curiosity 
might possibly enough lead many to attempt this even from 
a distance, to say nothing of those already supposed to be 
located in the Wady Aleyat, near the base of the mountain, 
to whom the injunction would more immediately apply.^' 

This much for the reasoning of Bartlett in favor of Ser- 
bal. Of his visit to that mountain he wrote : 

^^Thc path on leaving Wady Feiran follows the Wady 
Aleyat, and for some distance is tolerably easy, but becomes 



* Given in liis honk : we present Ji more elalx)nite one, taken from Lepsius. 



TOWARD SINAI. 349 

gradually more and more rugged as it ascends toward the 
base of the mountain ; yet it was evidently an old way, for- 
merly frequented^ as appeared from the ruined buildings, 
and the Siuaitic characters which we now and then found 
scratched on any convenient blocks of stones. The bed of 
this wady, as I have before remarked, is very rugged, and 
would with difficulty have served as a camping-ground for 
the Israelites, save on a very limited scale : there are two 
beautiful springs to relieve its sterility ; one was deep below 
us ; but the second, or upper one, lay directly in our course. 
The foliage, as at Feiran, is exquisitely beautiful around this 
upper spring ; the water welling out from it is colder and 
purer than that of the stream below : probably a small her- 
mitage or monastic establishment once existed here. Hence 
the isolated peaks of the Serbal tower up with awful magni- 
ficence, and seemingly defy the most adventurous : . . . . 
all path soon after ceased, and our course hence to the base 
of the mountain was over a wilderness of loose blocks, 
which it was no easy matter to cross without slipping, yet 
we occasionally found the Sinaitic characters inscribed upon 
them. So rugged was the way that, though but a single 
hour had elapsed since we left Feiran, I felt almost com- 
pletely tired when we reached the foot of the conical 
precipices, which rise sheer and abrupt from this scene 
of desolation. The only possible means of ascent is up 
a narrow and almost perpendicular chasm, dividing two 
of these impracticable peaks, half filled with huge crags 
fallen from above, and hurled one upon another in the most 
terrific confusion : to get to the top seemed to me impossible ; 
the guide, however, assured us there was no difficulty : with 
this we began to scramble up the chasm : .... to my- 
self, the clamber, though I had practised pretty well among 
the Alps, seemed so desperately toilsome, and so increasingly 
dangerous as we advanced, that but for the resolution of 
Komeh [the guide], who seemed determined to have me to 

30 



350 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT, 

the summit, I should have flinched and gone back again. 
We were exposed to the fierce sunbeams of an Arabian 
/> noon ; there were no steps to assist us, and hardly the faint- 

est trace of a path, though one had evidently formerly • 
existed; we had besides to climb up on our hands and knees 
great part of the way, in imminent peril of slipping down 
the polished surface of the fallen crags which we were sur- 
mounting, and of being dashed to pieces among those be- 
low. The fatigue of thus trailing like serpents up the 
face of the ascent was excessive; the higher we mounted, 
the more terrifically the mountain seemed to rear itself 
above, and if getting up seemed barely possible, descending 
again seemed perfectly hopeless. At length, after spending 
about three hours in this manner, we reached the summit, 
consisting of round, smooth masses of granite, which it 
required the greatest attention to get over without slipping. 
Trembling in every nerve with the violent exertion, we 
sat down under a huge block surmounting one of those con- 
ical peaks, which at a distance had seemed to me utterly 
inaccessible to all but the eagle and the gazelle." 

The descent occupied "nearly as long as the- climb;" 
Lepsius was two hours and a half descending; — "the path," 
he says, "the most difficult and most fatiguing I ever trod 
in the whole course of my life." 

The reader will scarcely feel that it is necessary, after 
this, to place before him any argument in refutation of the 
claims of this mountain to be the Sinai of the Scriptures, 
one so far off, and reached with such difficulty from the 
general encampment, at M'hich its summit would be only 
here and there visible, especially as the ])recincts of the 
other mountain, to which we shall soon conduct the i^eader, 
correspond to all the requisites of the Bible narrative in the 
delivery of the Law. It is true that the Wady Feiran is a 
most attractive spot, and the neighborhood of its rival is 
bare and dreary ; but tin* transactions at Sinai had a simple 



REPHIDIM—A BATTLE, 35 1 

and stern and solemn grandeur better suited to a place 
where nature, in the same stern simplicity, could leave the 
mind, unembarrassed by other thoughts, free to appreciate 
the majesty of the presence of God. 



CHAPTER XXXVI. 
REPHIDIM—A BATTLE. 



THE great hosts of Israel probably remained a consider- 
able time in this beautiful Wady Feiran ; for they were 
more than two months in getting from Egypt to Sinai,^ and 
the journey up to the time when they had received the 
^ manna, near to Feiran, had been a rapid one. Consequently 
after that event, onward to Sinai, their journey was marked 
by considerable delays. It is likely that their protracted 
occupancy of this spot, so choice amid the general dreariness, 
gave that offence to the Amalekites which brought on the 
fight with this people, which we shall presently detail. 

There are only three stations mentioned in the Bible as 
occurring between the " Wilderness of Sin^^ and Sinai ; but 
critics appear to be agreed that these are only the principal 
stopping-places, and do not designate the full number of 
encampments on the way. 

After leaving Feiran, the road might lead by a succession 
of wadys, and then finally across a narrow and very diffi- 
cult pass to the front of Sinai, or it might conduct them to 
the same spot by the large wady Sheikh (No. 17 on the 
map), which curves round by the northward, and after 
nearly a semi-circular course, finally opens out on the large 

* Ex. xix. 1. 



352 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

plain in front of Sinai. It is probable that they took the 
latter more easy route ; and Robinson supposes that it was 
in this wady, at a place where, after-shaving for a while left 
the granite for the sandstone region, it again enters among 
the gloomy, granitic precipices, that Rephidim (18?) is to be 
sought. 

Rephidim is a spot made famous in this journey by the 
murmurings of the people for water, and their insolence to 
Moses, toward whom they were, indeed, near offering per- 
sonal violence. It is probable that they left with great re- 
luctance the full stream and the verdure at Feiran ; and 
by their indulgence there, found the hardship all the greater 
now when, at their encampment at Rephidim, no water was 
to be had. The cloud had moved, and they had followed 
its moving : but the journey was with a predisposition to 
censoriousness and angry complaint. Indeed, they were 
beginning to have obdurate hearts even with regard to 
Jehovah himself. Night after night, the manna had de- 
scended and they had received bread '' to the full :'^ but 
this supply had continued now a month, and had got to be 
almost like what we call " a law of nature ;'^ for it was as 
regular and seemingly as natural as the fall of dew. What 
comes regularly even as a free gift, we soon begin to regard 
as our right, forgetting the giver ; and so the manna was 
itself ceasing to bring forth expressions of gratitude. A 
spirit of insolence was beginning to grow up in the people. 
Only two months had elapsed since they had been slaves; 
and in that short j)eriod they had advanced, first through 
the joy of deliverance, then through triumph over their 
enemies, then into a miraculous sustenance ; and now they 
were already becoming proud and presumptuous. Water 
was wanting in Rephidim. At Marah, under similar suffer- 
ing, even after three days' deprivation, they had simply 
asked of Moses, '' Wliat shall we drink V but here at 
Rephidim. they came l>(>l(lly up to lilni and siiid, ^^ (rive us 



REPHIDIM—A BATTLE, 353 

water that we may drink/^ using other insolent words. 
His patience is admirable : '' Why chide ye with me ?^^ he 
said ; ^^ wherefore do ye tempt the Lord V^ '' Wherefore/' 
cried some of them^ '' is this^ that thou hast brought us up 
out of Egypt to kill us and our children and our cattle 
with thirst?'' And they were near stoning him. He cried 
to God ; and his cry was now almost one of despair with 
regard to his countrymen ; for it was not for help^ which 
he knew would come, but^ '' What shall I do unto this peo- 
ple ? they be almost ready to stone me/' Indeed, they 
were insolent toward heaven, for they were saying to each 
other, ^^Is the Lord among us or not?" 

He was directed by the divine authority to call the elders 
of the people, and then taking these, to go with them before 
the angry, scowling multitudes ; and with the rod which he 
had stretched over the Red Sea for their deliverance, he was 
to strike a rock, and was assured that water should flow out. 
He did so : water burst forth in such abundance as to satisfy 
their thirst. He named the place Massah, '' Temptation,^' 
and Meribah, '' Chiding." The names were to be a memo- 
rial, while they remained there, of their insolence. 

But a lesson was to be given them in order to repress 
their presumption and to show them how necessary their 
great leader — greatest always in his patience — was to their 
safety. Word was here brought in that the stragglers in the 
rear, the faint and weary and feeble and the careless lag- 
gards, were set upon by an enemy, the Amalekites, who 
were putting them to death. These Amalekites were a 
nomadic tribe, occupying this part of Arabia and the region 
lying northwardly toward Canaan ; and they now looked 
with the keenest alarm on the invasion of their territory by 
such an immense multitude, of whose purposes they could 
not form any surmise. Probably they had retired before 
the great host from their favorite valley of Feiran ; but 
they now hung upon their outskirts, as they were retiring, 

30* 



354 I^IFE'SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

and with results of which Moses ^yas at once informed. He 
sent for Joshua/ the leader elect of the Israelitish fighting 
men, and told him to choose out soldiers and to take them 
on the morrow to give battle with the Amalekites, while he 
himself would stand in a conspicuous place with the rod in 
his hand. Accordingly the next day, Moses and Aaron and 
Hur (another chosen friend), repaired to the top of an ad- 
joining hill, while Joshua and his band made an attack on 
the enemy. It was felt by all the Israelites to be a time 
decisive of their future position in this country, perhaps of 
their safety and lives : and they gazed on the three men on 
the eminence — the rod uplifted, and heard the sounds of bat- 
tle, and soon were informed also that, while the rod was 
held up, their soldiers were victorious, but when from 
fatigue it was lowered, the enemy were prevailing. Aaron 
and Hur lent their assistance in sustaining the arms of 
Moses ; and so through the rest of the day success was with 
the Israelite combatants, till at its close the enemy were 
thoroughly routed and put to flight. 

Moses was afterward directed from heaven to make a 
written^ record of this attack by the Amalekites, which 
record was to be afterward brought to the notice of Joshua, 
who was to take vengeance on this people in future 
times. An altar was built here, and called Jcliovali-nissij 
^^Jehovah my banner,'' metaphorically mij sign,^ for it was to 



* This 18 the first notice of this general, who finally was so con- 
spicuous in the biblical record. His character, as it becomes afterward 
developed, shows him to have been worthy of the important trusts com- 
mitted to him by the ^reat leader. Ilis name was at first Oshea and 
Jehoshua (Num. xiii. 8, 16) : then Joshua; all of them signifying saviovrj 
deliverer. In the New Testament he is called Jesus (Acts vii. 45; Heb. 
iv. 8). This is his name also in the Septuagint. 

■ This is the first time thiii writing is distinctly noticed in the Scriptures, 
Init the i)as8age shows that such mode of communicating thought was well 
known among the peopk*. 

8 This is the meaning of the word in Num. xxvi. 10. 



REPHIDIM—A BATTLE. 355 

be a remembrancer of the destruction which was to be 
brought upon Amalek. The fight had doubtless not been a 
regular one as by soldiers in battle array, but conducted in 
the nomadic method by swift onsets and retreats and onsets 
again, in a scattering manner. It was, however, an event- 
ful one to the Israelites, for it settled for the present the 
question of their superiority, and kept them from further 
assaults of this description. Among themselves also it 
strengthened Moses in his position as leader: here, as at the 
Red Sea, their deliverance had been through his signal act. 

Not long afterward it was announced to him, one day, 
that a party of natives of another description were at the 
outskirts of his camp. These consisted of Jethro, his father- 
in-law, accompanied by the wife and two sons of Moses, 
probably also by attendants from the tribe. In the sus- 
picious state of feeling and the excitement in the vast 
encampment, it Avould have been dangerous to venture in, 
and they remained at a short distance without ; and there, 
soon, a very joyful meeting took place. We can see the 
aged sheikh standing before the Israelite hosts in the 
dignity of the free Arab life ; we see their great leader 
bowing in obeisance before him, and then, as they do now, 
kissing him on both cheeks with the half embrace; and 
then the salutations with the wife and sons. We remember 
that he had sent these latter back, when on his way to meet 
the dangers of delivering his people from Egypt : now they 
could be with him, and give him the cheering relief of their 
society again. Jethro, on being informed of what had 
occurred in Egypt, blessed God in words that show the 
devoutness of his heart ; and having offered burnt-offerings 
and sacrifices to God, next made a feast for the elders of the 
Israelite camp. 

But the leader of this immense host had little time 
allowed him for social enjoyments. The host was a great 
medley of all kinds of people and all kinds of conflicting 



356 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

interests ; and the multitudes crowded to hira to settle their 
difficulties. He had allowed them to come; for it gave him 
opportunities of informing their minds, for as he said, " I 
do make them know the statutes of God and his laws." 
But Jethro saw that, however commendable was the motive 
of tenderness to them and of kindness in communicating 
knowledge, the labor was too much for one man, and that 
he was wearing his life out in the effi^rt. The more prudent 
sheikh advised him to select proper persons, and put them 
as rulers over thousands, also inferior ones over hundreds, 
and then again others over tens : and the rule in such selec- 
tion is one that should be written before all nations as their 
guide : they were to be ''such as fear Gody men of truth and 
hating covetous7iessJ^ The highest and most difficult cases 
for adjudication were to be brought before Moses, who was 
to be " for the people," said Jethro, " to God-ward, that thou 
mayest bring the causes unto God." The advice was fol- 
lowed, and not only was Moses relieved of a too heavy 
burden of duty, but also the vast multitudes were brought 
more into system ; and a degree of regularity began to 
establish itself It was a good preparation for greater 
events now about to ensue. 



CHAPTER XXXVII. 

S/NAL 

" A ND they departed from Repliidim and pitched in the 
-^^ wilderness of Sinai:" *^and there Israel encamped 
before the mount."^ 



* Num. xxxiii. 15; Ex. xix. 2. 



SINAI, 357 

We are now coming to events the most stupendous in 
their physical aspects that the world has ever known ; and 
in order to prepare for them we will endeavor to have a 
clear and distinct idea of the region in which they trans- 
pired, — Mount Sinai, with the adjacent ground. 

The reader is here presented with a carefully made copy 
of a photograph of that mountain, recently taken in the best 
style of the invaluable art of sun-painting ; and this with 
the accompanying reliable map, will give him the means of 
comprehending the following descriptions. In addition to 
what has already been said respecting the want of adaptation 
in the grounds about Serbal to the requirements in Scripture 
history, it is as well to say that there is no other spot than 
this of Sinai known in the peninsula where the mountain 
and adjoining grounds do answer to such requirements. It 
appears therefore that adding to this fact the old traditions 
respecting the place, we need have no hesitation in speaking 
of the place before us as the scene of the wonderful 
event now to be noticed^ — an event transcended in import- 
ance and moral grandeur by only one other on our globe, — 
the Crucifixion at Calvary. 

This mountain, which we shall therefore call Sinai,^ is 



^ The mountain is first mentioned only as Horeh in Ex. iii. 1 ; then also 
in Ex. xvii. 6 ; and the same is necessarily implied in Ex. iii. 12 ; iv. 
28 ; xvii. 5. The name Sinai is first used Ex. xix. 1, 2, where the 
Israelites are said to have departed from Kephidim, and come to the 
^'desert of Sinai." From this time, with one exception (Ex. xxxiii. 6), 
during their whole sojourn in the vicinity, Sinai alone is spoken of: Ex. 
xix. 11, 18, 23 ; xxiv. 16 ; xxxi. 18 ; xxxiv. 29, 32 ; Lev. vii. 38 ; xxv. 
1 ; xxvi. 46 ; xxvii. 34 ; Num. i. 1 ; iii. 1, 14. In Num. x. 12, they break up 
from Sinai ; and in the list of stations. Num. xxxiii. 15, Sinai also naturally 
appears. But, elsewhere, after their departure, and through the whole book 
of Deuteronomy (except in the song of Moses xxxiii. 2), Horeh alone is 
named ; and the same events are spoken of as occurring on Horeb which 
were before described as taking place on Sinai ; Deut. i. 2, 6, 19 ; iv. 10, 15 ; 
V. 2 ; ix. 8 ; xxix. 1. Later sacred writers employ both names, until " in 
the New Testament, Sinai alone is read." Some writers, apparently on 



35S LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

about three miles in length, and like the other mountains of i 
the peninsula stands disjointed and single, though closely 



Map of Mount Sinai and its vicinity. 
English Miles. 




f I* llpl|\K''v-. 







jir # 



V 



w. 


/.^' 


V 




.x^^- 




'\, 



A, Tlio part of th« Tnoiintaln called by tho Arabs Jebel Sooksafeh ; B, The part called Jebel 
MOHrt : C, PoHition of tho pr(>«ent convent : D, Wady Sheikh : E, Plain of er-Rahah. From 
C, a Blanting and not difficult road loads np to the central part of the summit. Jebel 
SookHafeh is tho front presented in tho accompanying picture: its nunimit can be reached 
cither by the slanting but circuitous road fVom C, or, with more difhculty, directly in front 



justifiable groundR, consider the whole mountain as meant by the term 
Jforehy and tho lofty bluff at its northern end, overlookiii<^ the ])lain, afl 



SINAI. 



359 




M \\. ,iii;i.ii:"i,., .;.,\V.. 



illl iiliiil, 













III \'(. 



SINAI. 361 

surrounded by mountains of a similar kind. The traveller, 
coming from the northward, and surmounting one of the 
lowermost of these adjoining eminences, will suddenly have 
before him a plain twenty-seven hundred feet wide, now 
called er-Rahah ; and will see at its opposite side, rising 
sheer from the edge of the plain to the height of about 
fourteen hundred feet, a bare, black mountain, set among 
other mountains, but the most impressive among them all 
in consequence of its broad massiveness of almost perpen- 
dicular front and a seeming greater majesty in its solid, 
compact, firm strength ; as if it were indeed made, and 
placed there, to sustain in its singleness, the mightiness of 
Jehovah^s evident presence in his most astounding visitation 
to man. No one can look on it, and on the large plain 
spread out below, — the latter a unique instance among these 
rugged, crowded mountains, — without feeling that a prepara- 
tion has seemingly been made here for something wonderful, 
and grand as wonderful ; and the heart is prepared for all 
that impressiveness, that overwhelming greatness of glory, 
and that terrific grandeur, which we know were here once 
exhibited and felt by the cowering millions of Israelites 
spread over this plain below. 

The map will show the reader that several wadys 
here unite, and that the one called Wady Sheikh is an 
an unusually wide one ; and thus a plain is formed, of which 
Robinson says : '' We may fairly estimate the whole plain 
at two geographical miles long and ranging in breadth from 
one to two-thirds of a mile ; or it is equivalent to a surface 
of at least one square mile. This space is nearly doubled 
by a recess on the west and by the broad and level area of 
Wady Sheikh on the east, which issues at right angles to the 
plain, and is equally in view of the front and summit of the 
present Horeb [Sinai]. . . . The encampment before the 
mountain must not improbably include only the head- 
quarters of Moses and the elders, and of a portion of the 

31 



362 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

people ; the whole remainder, with their flocks were scat- 
tered among the adjacent valleys.'^ 

The mountain is a distinct mass of dark granite, and has 
on its east the narrow Wady Shubeib, in which is the pres- 
ent convent (marked C on the map : its place is designated 
by a tree on the left hand of the mountain in the view). 
On the west is Wady el-Leja, beyond which westwardly is 
Jebel Hum, terminated at the southern end by Jebel 
Catherin, the highest peak in this neighborhood.^ 

At the convent a path commences and leads slantingly, 
by no very difficult ascent, to the top of the mountain ; and 
the traveller, having gained this summit, will find before 
him a small plain sprinkled over with grass and shrubs. 
This is near the central part of the ridge ; and from it an 
easy ascent southwardly conducts to what is called Jebel 
Musa, or Mount of Moses, the highest part of the mountain, 
which is at its southern end. It is a rounded peak, having 
an elevation of 7217 feet above the level of the sea. The 
name of this loftiest portion indicates the nature of the pre- 
vailing belief, both among the Arabs and the monks of the 
convent below, that this is the spot where the Law-giving 
occurred ; but this idea is rejected by both Robinson and 
Olin, on the ground that its peak is hidden from the plain 
by the intervening northern summits. Robinson says, " No 
part of the plain is visible from the summit [Jebel Miisa], 
nor are the bottoms of the adjacent valleys ; nor is any spot 
to be seen around it where the people could have been 
assembled.'^ After visiting Jebel Musa, and finding it so 
little in accordance w^ith the requirements of the historic 
events. Dr. liobinson and his companion determined on 
exploring the northern end of the mountain (the one pre- 
sented in our picture), with which no one of their monkish 

* The higlicst mountains of the peninsula are, in Ennjlish feet, above the 
Bea level— Shaumer, 8238; (^itharin, 8272; Jel)el Musa, 7217; SerbaJ, 
6506, or 6342 French feet. 



SINAL 363 

or Arab attendants seemed to have any minute acquaintance, 
and which they had to explore without assistance from 
others. Commencing at the plain already noticed, midway 
along on the summit, and proceeding toward the north, they 
came to a steep ascent ; then to a small basin ; then to two 
more similar ascents and basins ; and then to a cliff rising 
about five hundred feet, its highest part about half a mile 
distant. They could not climb its sides in a direct course, 
as these were too smooth and precipitous ; but they went up 
by a ravine, and reached the summit. He says there " The 
extreme difficulty of the ascent was well rewarded by the 
prospect that now opened upon us. The whole plain of er- 
Eahah lay spread out beneath our feet, with the adjacent 
wadys and mountains ; while Wady esh-Sheikh on the right 
and the recess on the left, both connected with, and opening 
broadly from, er-Rahah, presented an area which serves 
nearly to double that of the plain.^^ 

" Our conviction,^^ he adds, " was strengthened, that here, 
or on some one of the adjacent cliffs, was the spot where the 
Lord ^descended in fire^ and proclaimed the Law. Here 
lay the plain where the whole congregation might be assem- 
bled ; here was the mount that could be approached and 
touched, if not forbidden; and here the mountain brow, 
where alone the lightnings and the thick cloud would be 
visible, and the thunders and the voice of the trump be 
heard, when the Lord ' came down in the sight of all the 
people upon Mount Sinai !^ ^^ 

Rev. Dr. Olin, who had ascended Jebel Musa by the 
usual route, and was also dissatisfied with the result of this 
visit, determined, in company with a firiend, to attempt the 
direct ascent from er-Rahah to the summit, that is, up the 
front here presented in the picture. The Arabs, he says, 
call that northern peak, Sooksafe; and he adds, "Jebel 
Sooksafe rises from a broad and spreading base into several 
high and almost perpendicular peaks. It has an aspect of 



364 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

awful and imposing grandeur, and though inferior to the 
neighboring summit [Jebel Musa] in elevation, far surpasses 
it in effect/^ His journal proceeds — 

^^ March 16th [1840], I spent this day in exploring the 
summit at the southern extremity of Jebel Mousa [Musa], 
the Sooksafe of the Bedouins. It was an excursion of much 
interest, but involving great fatigue and anxiety. I left the 
convent with Mr. C, by the passage leading into the garden, 
about 9 A. M. . . . We proceeded along the narrow valley 
[Wady Shubeib] to Wady el Raha [er-Raha], and turning 
to the west, were soon at the base of Sooksafe. We com- 
menced our ascent along the western side of a low granite 
ridge, which runs in the proper direction, and found ourselves 
in due time upon the summit of which this is the base. At 
first we walked upon fragments of stone that had fallen 
from the regions above; but soon reached the solid bare 
rock, of which the mountain is chiefly composed, over Avhich 
we pursued the largest part of our way to the top. It is 
slightly disintegrated, presenting a rough surface, which 
greatly diminished the danger of slipping. A second ele- 
vation of a steeper and more laborious ascent was now be- 
fore us. There were no less than four of these cliifs, each 
of which would, in other localities, be regarded as lofty, 
standing nearly in a right line with the object of our toil, 
and forming so many stages of the ascent. The second pre- 
sented no serious obstacle to our advance, and was soon sur- 
mounted. The next was steeper, and the surface of the 
rock, possessing greater solidity than the masses below, was 
too smooth to afford a good foothold ; and as the slope near 
the summit became very steep, our progress was difficult 
and fatiguing. We were induced by the imposing appear- 
ance below us to descend into a narrow gorge lying directly 
between the last of the minor elevations and the towering 
form of Jebel Sooksafe, which offered to our view an im- 
mense, solid mass of rock, rising to the height of several 



SINAI. 365 

hundred feet, and absolutely perpendicular. We hoped, 
however, to discover some less forbidding prospect, by pass- 
ing around its base to the eastern or southern side. Our 
ascent up the ravine was facilitated by a great number of 
rocks and fragments of granite, which had fallen from the 
heights above and lodged in the channel. They formed, in 
several places', laborious and steep stairs. Before reaching 
the front, where we had hoped to find some practicable slope 
by which we might be able to ascend the threatening moun- 
tain that overhung us, our passage was suddenly stopped by 
a yawning precipice. At the bottom, which appeared to be 
two hundred feet below us, was a narrow vale enclosed by 
precipitous rocks of great height, and covered with shrubs. 
Some deep gorge, concealed from our view, probably ex- 
tended from this to one of the valleys below. Our hopes of 
success on this side at least, were blasted. . . . We found, 
however, on further examination, a part of the cliff where 
we could commence the ascent, though it appeared to become 
impracticable at a higher elevation. The attempt succeeded 
beyond my expectations. The narrow bed of a decomposed 
vein of porphyry offered us at first an unexpected facility. 
When this failed, we succeeded in pulling ourselves up the 
no longer perpendicular mass by means of small cavities in 
its surface, such as I have already described. The slope 
now became so gentle that we could creep along on our 
hands and feet, though a miss-step must have been fatal. 
[They soon after exulted in the accomplishment of their 
object.] 

'' The summit of Sooksafe, which seen from the Wady el- 
Raha, seems but a point, spreads out into a level area of 
considerable extent, composed of dark gray, sunburnt 
granite. The view from this point is little inferior to that 
from Sinai [Jebel Musa], and embraces nearly the same 
region. I was most gratified to find that it perfectly com- 
mands the plain of el Raha, and that every object of suffi- 
31 * 



366 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

cient magnitude, and every transaction upon its summit, 
must have been seen by the encamped Israelites. There are 
two other summits on this end of the mountain, rather more 
lofty than these, within the distance of half a mile or a 
little more. I ascended them, to see whether they had any 
claim to the honor which I had already awarded to the first. 
I was soon satisfied that they had not. Only a small part 
of the plain was visible from them.'^ 

The reader has now perhaps a pretty correct idea of this 
spot, so fitted to be the scene of most wonderful and sublime 
events. The feeling that most impresses itself upon travel- 
lers amongst these mountains, even apart from all historic 
associations, is solemnity. These great, distinct elevations, 
though often rough and jagged, are all massive, and are 
marked with the impressive grandeur of seeming eternal 
endurance and majesty. There is also such a depth of re- 
pose, as if eternal silence, on peak above or in vale below, 
held jealous dominion, not allowing even the whisperings 
of a breeze to break its continuity. 

But, even at this day, that silence is sometimes broken so 
wonderfully and grandly that it seems as if God might even 
yet be there, speaking in a manner to be recognized by our 
ear. The mountains are so packed together in close proximity, 
yet with deep precipitous valleys between ; there is such a 
vast number of them, all distinct, all solid and massive; and 
they are so bare and thus so fitted, for reverberations, that a 
peal of thunder among them is the grandest of all earthly 
sounds. 

If the reader of this has ever been at our national Mili- 
tary Academy amid the depths of the Highlands, when its 
heavy guns have been fired, he will remember well the re- 
turned roar from all the surrounding crags; and how the 
sound went leaping from peak to peak, and was sent back, 
now in a faint echo, and then again in a multitude as of 
great explosions, and then faintly again, and was caught up 



THE DECALOGUE, 367 

and carried far off, whence it spake back in expiring mur- 
mars or in one last echo all by itself. What then must be 
the effect of thunder among the naked peaks of this penin- 
sula of Sinai ! And we must try to imagine it before we 
can have an idea of the scenes at the giving by Jehovah 
of his Law; for that, we know, was with ^^ thunders and 
lightnings/^ A thunder storm there has been described by 
a traveller, Dr. Stewart ; but the description, though graphic, 
still must fall greatly below the reality, for what description 
can reach the power of such an effect? He says, *^ Every 
bolt, as it burst with the roar of a cannon, seemed to awaken 

a series of distinct echoes on every side They swept 

like a whirlwind among the higher mountains, becoming 
faint as some mighty peak intervened, and bursting with 
undiminished volume through some yawning cleft, till the 
very ground trembled with the concussion. It seemed as if 
the mountains of the whole peninsula were answering one 
another in a chorus of the deepest bass. Ever and anon a 
flash of lightning dispelled the pitchy darkness and lit up 
the mountain as if it had been day; then, after the interval 
of a few seconds, came a peal of thunder, bursting like a 
shell, to scatter its echoes to the four quarters of the hea- 
vens, and overpowering for a moment the loud howling of 
the wind.^^ ^ 



CHAPTER XXXVIII. 
THE DECALOGUE, 



WE accompany now the vast multitudes of the Israelites, 
as coming either by Wady Sheikh or by the shorter 
and rougher way of Ntikb Hawy (" Windy Pass'^), over 



1" Tent and Khan." 



36S LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

the hill at the north they finally debouched out upon the 
plain of er-Rahah ; and on it and on the gentler elevations 
adjoining, soon had their encampment formed. It was, 
indeed, a vast and most interesting, moving panorama, — this 
company of two or three millions of persons, with their 
flocks and herds ; while above them rested that mysterious 
pillar of the cloud, — now to remain there stationary for 
nearly a year. 

A strange mystery, indeed, there was in all things con- 
nected with this people. At night that mysterious pillar of 
fire w^as still to give its light ; and through all the silent 
hours to the breaking of day, was to come down upon them 
that mysterious food of manna, the quiet token of God's 
constant, providing care. 

But God was about to speak to them here in audible 
tones. Hitherto his communications had been to Moses 
and Aaron ; or, far back in their history, to Abraham and 
their other patriarchs. But there was now a vast work to be 
done, — that of elevating a whole nation rapidly to a know- 
ledge of him ; — of educating an immense multitude into 
the highest science, the science of knowing and understand- 
ing God. Who was to teach ? How was the teaching to 
be brought within the comprehension of such an ignorant, 
debased multitude, and to be impressed indelibly upon their 
minds and hearts ? There were no books for the multitude ; 
few persons that could inform them orally ; and the oral, 
and, indeed, any other lessons, on such an obtuse and capri- 
cious people would have little permanent effect. • How then 
teach and enlighten them, and how mould them rightly 
now, at the very beginning, when they could yet be moulded 
at all? It must be done soon. God was now going to 
write the lesson for them on the sky here at Sinai, and to 
flash it before their eyes ; and his thunders were to be his 
voice sounding in their ears. What he had before spoken 
to the patriarchs, and to INIoscs and Aaron singly, he was 



THE DECALOGUE. 369 

here to speak to the whole nation. They were all to be 
taught, and were afterward to be a demonstration of him 
and for him, before the world for all future history ; — God 
in history, a volume that the world might read. For this 
he had brought them to Sinai, Therefore the cloud now 
rested there. 

That mountain, so silent now, so rough in crag and pin- 
nacle, and so weathered by many ages of heat and storm, has 
yet a majesty unrivalled on our globe ; and as in our thoughts 
we gaze at it, the old scenes recorded of it, all so terrific 
when the loud thunder caught from its summit reverberated 
from the thousand peaks of mountains scattered far and 
wide, and the lightnings flashed, and supernatural sounds in 
the intervals of the thunder filled the air, — all seem to come 
before us ; and we seem to hear God still speaking there 
amid that solemn and dread awfulness of his presence. 

The encampment had been formed. Far and wide over 
the plain, and along the wadys opening into it, was the vast 
city of tents. The people were scattered about in the vari- 
ous occupations attendant on a new nomadic home; some 
were seeking in the neighborhood such spots of pasturage 
as it would afford ; some were gazing in wonder, and with a 
feeling of awe, upon the bare dark heights that rose in such 
rugged majesty over their heads. The elders, so lately con- 
stituted into a body of judges for the people, were organ- 
izing for the great task before them ; — -for these millions of 
the suddenly aggregated and loosely cohering nation would 
give ample employment to such courts. 

Soon after the arrival at this place, Moses was summoned 
by the Deity to ascend the mountain. He may, in his visits 
to its heights, have gone by the easier ascent along its sides, 
or by a way less difficult than is yet known to us, up its 
front. 

Far up, on those solitary heights, God spoke to him. 
The scene was in accordance with the words. All around 



370 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

was a world of mountains outspread, peak after peak near 
and far away. Below were the encamped multitudes. 
The words to Moses were, 

" Thus shalt thou say to the house of Jacob, and tell the 
children of Israel : Ye have seen what I did unto the 
Egyptians, and how I bore you on eagles' wings and 
brought you unto myself. Now, therefore, if ye will obey 
my voice, indeed, and keep my covenant, then ye shall be a 
peculiar treasure unto me above all people : for all the earth 
is mine : and ye shall be unto me a kingdom of priests, and 
a holy nation.'' 

He came down, and having assembled the elders,^ deliv- 
ered the message, which was then communicated generally, 
the people answering to it, "All that the Lord hath spoken 
we will do." 

Again Moses ascended ; and now he was commanded to 
go down and to charge the people to be prepared, on the 
third day from that, to appear in clean garments and with 
pure hearts, to stand before God, who would then " come 
down in the sight of all the people upon Mount Sinai." 
He was also to have bounds prepared around the mountain; 
for neither man nor beast was to touch it : if they did so, 
it was to be at the j^eril of life. When the trumpet sounded 
they were to approach near to the mount. 

The preparations were made according to this command. 

The expectations of the people took every possible 
form ; but in every case they were raised to the highest 
degree. The minds of the most obtuse among them were 
beginning to have glimmerings of God, but still in the 
degree of general ignorance, their surmisings of what was 
now to come took fantastic, and often degraded shapes. 

But as, on the morning of the third day, all stood gazing 
toward the mountain, a thick cloud began to cover it. This 



Probably the heads of tribes. 



THE DECALOGUE. 371 

increased in thickness and darkness ; its black billowy forms 
rising and surging with tumultuous motion, while the solid 
earth shook and trembled as if with a convulsion that 
threatened destruction there and all around. Lightnings 
flashed from the cloud, and thunders pealed startling rever- 
berations from multitudinous peaks far and near. "And 
Mount Sinai was altogether on a smoke because the Lord 
descended upon it in fire : and the smoke thereof ascended 
as the smoke of a furnace, and the whole mount quaked 
greatly.^^ At intervals in the lulls of the reverberations 
from the thunder, were sounds as of a trumpet, raised 
louder and louder, till it seemed to take almost the force of 
the thunder itself. 

The people stood trembling, gazing in awe at the fearful- 
ness of this manifestation of God^s presence, a deep reve- 
rence filling their souls. It was a demonstration of the 
might and majesty of God suited well to their intellects. 

"And the Lord came down upon Mount Sinai, on the top 
of the mount.'^ 

Moses was called up, and was charged once more to go 
and see that the bounds were kept in order and the sanc- 
tity of the mountain observed ; after which he and Aaron 
were to go upward toward its summit. 

This was done ; and then was delivered to them the set 
of laws which we call the Decalogue, beginning with that 
firm, clear, decisive command to man's soul, 

" Thou shalt have no other gods before me.'^ 

The two men were above, veiled in that thick cloud and 
receiving those ten commandments which ever since have 
been a received rule for the world. The people below had 
shrunk away from about the mountain in awe and fear. 
The scene had overwhelmed them with its terrific majesty. 
They felt indeed that God was there ; and when the Lav/ 
was brought down to them, they knew that it was his. The 
words were strong and decisive, and were to last to the end 



37^ LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

of time ; the demonstration accompanying them was equally 
strong. 

When Moses and Aaron after their descent approached 
the people, the multitudes cried out to them, 

^^ Speak thou with us, and we will hear : but let not God 
speak with us, lest we die/^ The leader answered, 

" Fear not : for God is come to prove you, and that his 
fear may be before your faces, that ye sin not/^ 

The remainder, however, still crowded together in the 
distance, cowering and gazing in terror at the stupendous 
scene, while their leader ascended again and entered '^ the 
thick darkness, where God was/^ 



CHAPTER XXXIX. 
AT SINAL 



THE encampment remained at this place nearly a year;' 
and here, at various times and under varied circum- 
stances, the whole law for the government of the nation was 
written out. The people were becoming gradually improved 
in mind and character, but it is not in one year, or indeed 
in any sliort series of years, that a nation brought from 
their condition in Egypt can be reformed. They were now 
still a base people, with crude intellects ; and we have very 
soon a proof of the latent corruptions brought from their 
former home and servitude, and ready on all occasions to 
break out into action. 

Moses and Aaron and Nadab and Abihu and seventy of 
the elders, were called up to the mountain summit, and 



» Compare Num. x. 11, witli Ex. xix. 1. 



AT SINAI, 373 

there received manifestations of God, adapted to deepen the 
impressions of his greatness and glory ; and then Moses and 
" his minister Joshua^^ were summoned to an especial com- 
munication at the same place. The Decalogue was to be 
delivered inscribed on two tables of stone, and also other 
laws were to be given ; and as the time of absence would be 
a long one, the leader had deputed his authority for that in- 
terval to Aaron and Hur, assisted by the elders, with the 
injunction, " Tarry ye here for us, until we come again unto 
you/' 

The two remained on the mountain forty days and nights, 
during which time many laws were given to the leader 
alone ; among them one relating to ^^ a sanctuary'^ which 
was to be prepared, in which God might show his especial 
presence in the future onward movements of the Israelites. 
Commandments were also given respecting the consecration 
of Aaron and his sons to the priests' office, and to adminis- 
trations at the sanctuary, when it should be ready. Fi- 
nally, there was delivered, to Moses "the testimony, or Ten 
Commandments,'' written out on both sides of two tables 
of stone. 

Then he was warned to hasten back to the camp ; for the 
people, he was informed, had " corrupted themselves," and 
had turned already to the heathen worship. God said to 
him, " Let me alone, that my wrath may wax hot against 
them, and that I may consume them : and I will make of 
thee a great nation." But Moses cried, " Wherefore should 
the Egyptians speak and say. For mischief did he bring 
them out, to slay them in the mountains, and to consume 
them from the face of the earth ?" and he begged that the 
people for whom God had so signally manifested himself 
might be spared. 

He rejoined Joshua ; and as on their hurried way down, 
their ears caught sound of noises in the camp, the warrior- 
instincts of the latter suggested an attack by enemies: 

32 



374 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT, 

" There is a noise of war in the camp.'^ But Moses 
answered, ^' It is not the voice of them that shout for 
mastery, neither is it the voice of them that cry for being 
overcome : but the noise of them that sing do I hear/^ 

A very harrowing spectacle indeed met the eyes of the 
two men, as they came within sight of the camp. They 
saw a molten image of a calf: in a position to indicate that 
it had been worshipped, and before it the people were now 
engaged with music in sacred dances ! It was all one scene 
of disgusting heathenism with the mirth used before 
heathen idols, and an approach to heathen obscenity in the 
idol-worship, for the Jewish men were quite divested 
of their garments. 

Moses in his excited feeling dashed down the stone tables : 
for he felt to the depths of his soul that such a people were 
unworthy of any testimony from God ; and the tables were 
broken. He summoned Aaron, and demanded of him an 
account of this disgusting spectacle. The great Lawgiver's 
rage was hot, — as it might well be, and his guilty brother 
cowered before him. The account which the latter gave 
was this : — that the people, alarmed at the protracted ab- 
sence of Moses and Joshua, had at last come to him with 
the demand, ^^ Make us gods which shall go before us : for 
as for this Moses, the man that brought us up out of the 
land of Egypt, we wot not what is become of him." He 
had then told them to collect the golden ear-rings among 
the people, and bring the gold to him : " then I cast it into 
the fire, and there came out this calf.'^ His account was 
disin<>;enuous ; for he omitted to state that he had "fash- 
ioned it with a graving tool," after it had been cast ; and 
that as they had cried before it, " These be thy gods, O 
Israel, which brought thee up out of the land of Egypt," 
he himself had built an altar before it, and had made 
])roclamation, " To-morrow is a feast to the Lord," which 
feast they were now holding before the image. 



AT SINAI. 375 

Moses might well, indeed, be aghast at this intelligence ; 
for here was the heathen worship of Egypt, to draw them 
from which, as well as to make them a people sacred to God, 
they had been brought from that country by such miracu- 
lous interpositions. At Memphis, the great object of wor- 
ship was the bull, their god Apis; at On, adjoining to 
Goshen, it was the calf Mnevis : at the first trial of their 
faith, they had plunged directly back again into the worship 
of this calf. Reform among such a depraved, thankless, 
perverse people, seemed to be indeed a desperate undertaking. 
Their leader determined at once on making a terrible exam- 
ple, such as would be well remembered through all their 
future. He cried out, on seeing the shameless exposure of 
the Israelite men, " Who is on the Lord^s side, let him come 
unto me?^^ There might well be fear that none would 
come ; but the sons of Levi ranged themselves with him 
in a body. He commanded them in the name of " the Lord 
God of Israel,^^ to take their swords and slay from one end 
of the camp to the other. They did so, and " there fell of 
the people that day, about three thousand men.'^ He called 
upon the people then for a new consecration of themselves to 
God. A deep awe, and fear, and horror mingled themselves, 
in all the company, with this eflPort at a new consecration. 
He also had the golden calf ground into dust and in this 
condition mingled with water ; and he made them drink 
of it. 

On the morrow he addressed them. " Ye have sinned a 
great sin : and now I will go up unto the Lord ; perad ven- 
ture I shall make an atonement for your sin.^' He went, 
and in the acknowledgment before God, he said, ^^ Yet 
now, if thou wilt, forgive their sin : and if not, blot me I 
pray thee, out of thy book which thou hast written .^^ God 
had before offered to blot them out and to produce a great 
nation from him ; but the magnanimous leader wished to 
live or to die with them.. The people gathered up and buried 



376 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

their dead in much sadness. In addition to the loss of 
friends, an issue had been made between them and their 
great leader, and they felt the justice of his anger. God also 
showed his own displeasure of their act by afflicting them 
with a plague. 

Another grief there was to them, in seeing Moses now re- 
move his own tent^ to a spot without the camp, '^ afar off from 
the camp.^^ God was going to make himself manifest at it, 
but not among such a people ; aiid the rebuke was felt when, 
after this chief tent had been thus removed, they saw the 
cloud descend and envelop it, showing that the special 
Presence was now there. Sore at heart on account of the 
slain ; self-condemned, and ashamed ; grieved at this rebuke 
by the removal of the tent ; and awestruck at seeing the 
cloud descend, a witness of the mighty Majesty at their side, 
they " rose up and worshipped, every man at his tent door.^^ 
The great leader had in this tent many communications 
with Heaven : he did not reside in it, however, but there 
received those of the congregation who " sought the Lord.^^ 
Joshua had charge of it in the absence of his chief. 

Moses was now directed to prepare two tables of stone^ 



* Til is, although called Tabernacle in our version, was evidently not the 
great Tahernacle, which was not erected till some time subsequently : the 
original is ^riK tent : for the great Tabernacle we have piyo, Ex. xl. 17, 
18: in v. 19, he spread abroad ^nx over the pt^D, as if ^n>< meant 
cloth only. 

■ What kind of stone ? Robinson, when travelling toward Sinai, passed 
when near Wady WardA-n, among limestone hills, " some of them exhibit- 
ing an abundance of crystallized sulphate of lime." This was, in a straight 
line, ninety-one Knglish miles from Siniii : but the southern point of the 
Till range, which is also limestone and in which the sulphate of lime is 
probably to be found, is only twenty-five miles distant. No better substance 
for such inscription can be found, for its surface is perfectly smooth, it is 
compact and it can be easily inscribed on by steel or a piece of sharp flint. 
The Decalogue might be easily inscribed on two such plates as this, each 
no larger than a common-sized octavo i)age : for the character which was 
probably used, see pages 121 and 124 of this book. 



AT SINAI. 377 

like the first, and to take them with him to the summit of 
Sinai, where '' the testimony^^ or Decalogue was to be writ- 
ten on them as it had been on the broken tables. No man 
was to go up with him, nor were the flocks and herds to be 
allowed to feed before the mountain: it was to be again a 
sanctified spot. He obeyed the command, and '' the Lord 
descended in the cloud.^^ The Deity proclaimed himself 
there, and '' Moses made haste and bowed his head toward 
the earth and worshipped." He received other command- 
ments there, and was now again forty days and nights, 
miraculously sustained. He wrote also '' upon the tables 
the words of the covenant, the ten commandments." 

Forty days in such communion ! The sun shining upon 
our earth brightens it and spreads over it a reflex of its own 
glory : in that long time on Sinai, the face of Moses became 
the reflex of God^s especial presence ; nor did the bright- 
ness cease when he descended from the mountain : for 
his face, without his knowledge, shone with a strange, un- 
earthly brightness amazing to every beholder. Aaron him- 
self, as well as all the people, shrunk from him ; for the 
brightness was dazzling, and it looked as if he was not 
a human being but some heavenly visitant : as if in those 
forty days, death had taken him, and now a spirit in his 
form had descended from that mount. And doubtless there 
is actually but a very thin veil between the earthly and the 
heavenly, one which our grosser senses are but seldom 
allowed to penetrate, but through which they do sometimes 
catch glimpses of the upper glory. When the Christian 
Stephen stood, many years after this, before the council at 
Jerusalem, an advocate for Christ, '' all that sat in the coun- 
cil, looking steadfastly on him, saw his face as it had been 
the face of an angel :" and after his defence, ^' he, being 
full of the Holy Ghost, looked up steadfastly into heaven, 
and saw the glory of God, and Jesus standing on the right 
hand of God, and said. Behold I see the heavens opened, 

32^ 



37S LIFE SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

and the Son of Man standing on the right hand of God/' 
Cases sometimes still occur when in individuals at the verge 
of death, the soul about to spring into the glory of heaven 
catches glimpses of the glory, and the face, though yet human, 
shows a reflex of that brightness, while the eye beams as 
with a spiritual light and the tongue, in its last accents, 
tells of heaven already seen and known.^ 

Moses called the frightened, shrinking individuals back 
to him, and they saw that it was not a spirit, but himself, 
though with a wonderful illumination upon his features. 
Who can wonder that there was such an illumination after 
forty days in such a Presence ? On learning the cause of 
their terror, and to prevent its spreading, he put a veil over 
his face; and he afterward continued to do so, on coming 
down from such heavenly communings on the mount. 

In the further eflbrt now, under the divine control, to 
organize the civil and religious polity of the Israelites, that 
vast encampment was presently roused into activity, and was 
kept busy with transactions of an extremely interesting 
kind. It had l)ecome more evident, every day, that this 
people were not fitted for a purely intellectual understanding 
and worship of Jehovah, but must be operated upon through 
their outward senses and by the use of symbols and me- 
mentoes. Moses may have had hopes at the first to initiate 
them into a pure, simple religion, in which they would look 
directly up to God and feel joyfully his presence through 
the power of a clear, mighty faith. But their minds w^ere 
too gross for this. Their disposition to seize on emblems for 
the exercise of a religious sentiment had just been shown. 
Egypt was full of those emblems, and the hearts of these 
Israelites liad been so accustomed to a cultivation of faith 
by outward forms that it seemed now to be a vain effort 



^ For some remarkable recent cases see " Life-SceiiCvS from the Four 
Gospels," Chap, xxvi., second edition. 



AT SINAI. 2>19 

entirely to abstract those people from such helps to religious 
belief. The best that seemingly could now be accomplished, 
would be to simplify emblems to the utmost, and to bring 
forms as near as possible to a pure though strong exercise 
of faith. There must be no image of God, yet God must 
be felt by visible representations to be in their midst. 

Such appears to have been the idea under which, through 
the divine direction, the Tabernacle was to be made. 

There would be another benefit in this. The people were 
now idle and w^ould be so for nearly a year. Here would 
be something of a public character that would engross all 
minds, would give all of them employment and would 
cultivate and refine their taste: moreover, it would give 
them a present personal interest in the religious acts, such 
as people always entertain when they have contributed by 
wealth or labor for the furtherance of such acts. 

Moses made the appeal, " This is the thing which the 
Lord commanded, saying. Take ye from among you an 
offering unto the Lord : whosoever is of a willing heart, let 
him bring it, an offering of the Lord f and he specified 
gold, silver, brass, fine linen, dyed skins, precious stones, oil, 
spices, shittim-wood,^ etc. ;^^ and added, " every wise-hearted 
man among you shall come, and make all that the Lord 
hath commanded.^^ Bezaleel and Aholiab, their most expert 
artificers, whom Moses said, ^^God had filled with wisdom 
of heart to work all manner" of such work, were appointed 
to have a general superintendence ; and into their hands the 
Jewish leader put the offerings as they were poured in. 
These latter came rapidly in such great abundance that he 
was presently notified by these men that the people were 
bringing much more than enough; and he consequently 

^ St. Jerome describes this wood as "hard, tough, smooth, without knots 
and extremely beautiful : it is supposed to be the black acacia, which is 
found in the deserts of Arabia, and is so hard and solid as to be almost 
incorruptible." 



3S0 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

had a proclamation made ; and " the people were restrained 
from bringing. For the stuff they had was sufficient for 
all the work to make it, and too much." 

We can well imagine the general excitement, while bring- 
ing in these contributions, and while the work was going 
on ; " the women that were wise-hearted did spin with their 
hands, and brought that which they had spun, both of blue 
and of purple and of scarlet, and of fine linen :" " the 
rulers brought onyx stones, and stones to be set for the 
ephod, and for the breast-plate," and spices, etc., and we 
are told ^^ the children of Israel brought a willing offering 
unto the Lord." 

So the preparation for the Tabernacle progressed in the 
camp, while the great lawgiver was busy in his work of 
preparing the laws. Idleness and its brooding sensations 
had given way to pleasant employment and activity. Peo- 
ple were everywhere watching the progress of the work, 
were improved by the various criticisms made on the artistic 
skill of the workmen, and were ready to offer further con- 
tributions of precious metals or stones ; all were interested, 
all were alive to the advancing beauty and richness of the 
work, and all full of pleasant anticipations as to events 
which were to occur on its completion. 



CHAPTER XL. 
THE TABERNACLE. 



IT was coni])l('t('d in the tenth month after their arrival at 
Sinai.' Much of the carving was exceedingly elaborate, 
and the whole work formed indeed a great undertaking, if 



* Compare Ex. xl. 1, with xix. 1. 



THE TABERNACLE. 



381 



we consider the place where it was done and the means at 
their disposal. But on the first day of the new year, the 
Tabernacle, all complete, was set up, and it was an object 
which in itself might very well enlist their admiration. It 
had of course no solidity of architectural forms, for it had 
all to be of a nature to admit of its being moved ; but it 
had the peculiar gracefulness which drapery always gives, 
and the materials were also of the richest kinds. 











A 


■ 






6 


• 
2 


•■ 




• 6 
■ 


■ 5 


■ 3 
• 4 




B 






A 











s 

Plan of the Tabernacle and its Court, 

A, A, Court. B, B, Tabernacle. 1, Altar of burnt-oflferiiigs. 2, Laver. 3, Table of Shew- 

bread. 4, Golden Candlestick. 5, Altar of Incense. 6, Ark of the Covenant. 

There was, first, a rectangular enclosure one hundred and 
eighty-four feet long by ninety-two in width, and nine feet 
in height, made by curtains of fine twined linen, hung to 
pillars of brass filleted with silver, twenty on each side, and 
nine at each end. The eastern end, where was the entrance, 
had the curtains of blue, and purple, and scarlet colors, with 
cords to draw them up or aside. 

This outer part enclosed the court; and entering it by the 
richly-draped eastern end, the spectator would have just 
before him, an altar for burnt-offerings, nine feet on each 
side, and five and a half in height. Beyond it was the 
laver, made of brass, a contribution by the women, who had 
given their metallic looking-glasses for this purpose. Then, 



382 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

lastly, beyond the laver was the Tabernacle, which was rec- 
tangular also, fifty-five feet long, and one third of this in 
width and height : the two sides and the western end made 
of shittim-wood, secured by bars of the same wood over- 
laid with gold. At its eastern end were five pillars of this 
wood standing in sockets of brass, the capitals and fillets 
overlaid with gold, and the hooks of gold. This end was 
covered by a richly-embroidered curtain, supported by the 
columns, and made to be drawn so as to give admittance. 
The whole Tabernacle was lined at the sides and ceiling first 
with a curtain of fine linen, richly embroidered with figures 
of cherubim. Next over this was a covering of fine goats'- 
hair ; then one of rams'-skins, dyed red ; and finally there 
was an outer covering of a thicker kind of leather. 

To one entering the Tabernacle at this eastern end, there 
would be on his right hand a table three feet eight inches 
long, by one foot nine inches in width, and two feet eight 
inches in height, overlaid with gold, with a border of gold, 
and its dishes and bowls of gold. On this twelve loaves of 
bread were to be perpetually kept, with perhaps flour also. 
Opposite this, on the left, was a large golden candlestick 
with six branches, the branches and shaft, with the apper- 
taining lamps, etc., all of beaten gold. Then, further on 
and central, was the altar of incense, nearly two feet square, 
and three feet seven inches high, with a rich border around 
and horns at the corner, all of which were covered with 
gold. On this altar incense was to be burned every morn- 
ing and evening. 

This first chamber of the Tabernacle was called the Holy 
Place, and to it none but priests were admitted : beyond it 
and separated from it by four pillars set in sockets of silver, 
and with capitals of gold, and by curtains as at the main 
entrance, was the Most Holy Place, into which only the 
High Priest could enter, and for duty but once a year. It 
was eighteen feet two inches in each of its dimensions, and 



THE TABERNACLE. 383 

had in its centre the ^^Ark of the Covenant/^ a chest covered 
within and without with fine gold. This was four feet six 
inches long, by two feet eight inches in each of its other 
dimensions ; on it was '^ The Mercy-seat/^ of the same di- 
mensions as the top, and made of pure gold. On this 
mercy-seat he placed ^^ two cherubims of gold, beaten out 
of one piece made he them, on the two ends of the mercy- 
seat ; one cherub on the end on this side, and another cherub 
on the other end on that side ; out of the mercy-seat made 
he the cherubims on the two ends thereof. And the cheru- 
bims spread out their wings on high, and covered with their 
wings over the mercy-seat, with their faces one to another ; 
even to the mercy-seat-ward were the faces of the cheru- 
bims.^^ Cherubims were allegorical figures among the 
ancient Hebrews. Their form was sometimes compounded 
of that of a man, an ox, a lion, and an eagle, the well-known 
symbols of might and power (see Ezek. i. 10 ; compare 
Rev. iv. 6, 7).^ In the ark or chest were deposited, now, 
the two tables of stone containing the Ten Commandments, 
and a pot of manna which was to have the peculiarity of 
preserving its soundness. Afterward, the rod of Aaron was 
added, which just before being placed there had budded and 
brought forth fruit.^ 

All this workmanship had been the engrossing topic of 
thought, and the subject for pleasing observation in the 
Israelitish camp for months ; and now, when the tabernacle 
was put up, the multitudes gazed upon it with that deep inter- 
est and satisfaction which we have in seeing any successful 
works of our own hands, especially when the religious sen- 
timent in them is also predominant. They could not hope 



^ See also Gen. iii. 24 ; Ezek. x. 5, 19 ; Ps. Ixxx. 1 ; xcix. 1 ; Ezek. x. 
14, etc. Ezekiel's visions have numerous allusions of this kind, and Lay- 
ard says that sculptured figures of this description are frequent on the 
palace walls at Nineveh. 

2 Heb. ix. 4. 



384 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT, 

to vie, in their nomadic life, with the solid grandeur of the 
Egyptian temples ; but here was the utmost that gold and 
silver and elaborate ornamental carving and fine needle- 
work could produce, and also what the mind always ac- 
knowledges with satisfaction, — the beauty of drapery in 
rich colors; and most of all, in any comparisons with 
Egypt, the God for whom this temple was prepared had 
shown himself the only true God, before whom all Egyptian 
power, whether in wizard or priest or monarch or armed 
force, had succumbed. 

So the multitude, in dense crowds around, or from good 
points of observation on the adjoining eminences, watched 
to see part after part of the Tabernacle and the walls of its 
court erected, and to see the golden furniture carried in, 
and the altars and laver put in position ; and when this was 
done, they were contemplating the full effect, when suddenly 
their attention was drawn to a motion in the pillar of cloud 
which had so long been their mysterious companion and 
guide. The cloud floated along over the new erections, and 
then descended and enveloped them entirely, and "the glory 
of the Lord" filled the Tabernacle, so that even Moses him- 
self was not able to enter amid the dazzling effulgence, 
until its first overwhelming brightness had abated. And 
ever after this, when they were in encampment, directly 
over the Tabernacle rested the cloud by day and the pillar 
of fire tlirough the night. When the cloud ascended, they 
knew that the signal for an onward movement was given: 
while it continued to rest over this holy place, they were 
quietly to remain. 

On this first occasion of the descent of the cloud, their 
hearts beat with indescribable emotions ; their eyes were 
filled with tejirs of a deep joy ; a soft murmur of the gratified 
T3Ut awed multitude spread over the plain and hill-sides. 
God, they felt, wjis approving their work, and had come to 
dwell more directly among them than ever befon . 



THE TABERNACLE, 385 

Aaron was to be the High Priest. God in consideration 
of having passed by the houses of the Israelites in their last 
night in Egypt, claimed all their first-born of man and in- 
ferior animals ; but in place of the former, he took to him- 
self the tribe of Levi, which was to furnish priests and 
attendants at his sanctuary. Moses and Aaron were of this 
tribe. The former at the beginning of this journey exer- 
cised the office of chief priest as well as legislator ; but these 
duties were afterward transferred entirely to his brother. 
To go into a description of the dresses of the priests and 
their attendants and their various duties would require more 
space than can be given to it in the present work ; but we 
notice a few items in the dress which should not be omitted. 
The e'pliod was a square piece of linen cloth, worn before 
and behind, the two pieces being joined together on the 
shoulders by buckles, and fastened to the body by a belt. 
In the case of the high priest it was of blue and purple and 
scarlet colors, and ornamented with gold, and the buckles 
were of onyx^ stones, having on them the names of the 
twelve tribes. Over the ephod was the ^' breast-plate of judg- 
ment,^^ so called because the High Priest wore it whenever 
he went into the Tabernacle to consult God about the peo- 
ple. It consisted of twelve precious stones set in gold, in 
four parallel rows, each having on it the name of one of the 
tribes. It is added in the Scriptures, " And thou shalt put 
in the breast-plate of judgment the Urim and the Thum- 
mim ; * and they shall be upon Aaron's heart when he goeth 



1 Supposed to be clialcedonj. 

'^ Urim is the plural of ys^^ light or fire: Thummim the plural of on, 
integrity : the Septaagint has for them ^^Xwo-t? and dX^Osia, revelation and 
truth. Luther gives to the words the meaning Light and Bight. Josephus 
and the Rabbins say that the Urim and Thummim consisted of the stones 
in the breast-plate. Others suppose that we are to understand by them 
small oracular figures derived from Egyptian usages ; it is impossible to 
determine now what was meant. In the passage above quoted, (Ex. xxviii, 
33 



386 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

in before the Lord ; and Aaron shall bear the judgment of 
the children of Israel upon his heart before the Lord con- 
tinually/^ 

Another striking object in the costume of the High Priest 
was the mitre, a high and ornamented turban, having in 
front of it a gold plate on which was inscribed Holiness to 
the Lord. Neither he, nor the inferior priests, appear to 
have used their sacred dresses except when on duty in the 
Tabernacle. 

The erection of the Tabernacle, and with it the institution 
of various offerings and forms, led to complications in 
religious duties which put an end to the beautiful simplicity 
which had distinguished the heart-worship when Moses 
sang his impromptu hymn and Miriam led in timbrel music 
on the shores of the Ked Sea, or when the congregation 
bowed awe-struck and in humiliation before the sacred 
mountain ; but such spontaneity in the multitudes could 
not be ahvays trusted. It was necessary that worship 



30), where the words are used for the first time, they are introduced in the 
Hebrew with the definite article the, as if something previously known was 
spoken of. Diodorus Sicuhis, who flourished about 44 years B. C, in his his- 
tory of the Egyptians, says of the president of the courts of justice, " He bore 
about his neck a goklen chain, at which hung an image set about or com- 
posed of precious stones, which was called TrutK^ (Lib. i. CAP. 75), and 
adds that as soon as the president put this gold chain about his neck, legal 
proceedings commenced, but not before ; and that when the case of the 
plaintiff had been fully and fairly heard, the president turned the image 
of truth, which was hung to the golden chain about his neck toward the 
person whose cause was found to be just, by which he seemed to intimate 
that truth was on his side. 

^lian (about A. D. 120) gives the same account. He says, "The chief 
justice or president was always a ])riest of venerable and acknowledged 
probity. He had always an image which he called truth, cut on a sap- 
phire, and hung about his neck with a gold chain." 

The inference which seems to come from all this is, that the Urim and 
Thummim were something previously known to tlie Israelites, were proba- 
bly coimected with judicial awards, and were used by Aaron in signifying 
the Divine decisions which he received in the Tabernacle. 



THE TABERNACLE, 3S7 

among such ignorant and irregular crowds should be sys- 
tematized ; and he found it necessary also to appeal to their 
feelings by outward show and to keep their interest awake 
by constantly recurring forms. 

Aaron and his two oldest sons, Nadab and Abihu, were 
consecrated by Moses, and instituted into their offices of 
service at the Tabernacle, where the first sacrifices consisted 
of an atonement made for them. They were afterward to 
remain at the door of the Tabernacle, day and night, for 
seven days. 

On the eighth day Moses called together the elders of 
Israel, and with them proceeded into the courts of the 
Tabernacle, where Aaron and his sons were to receive from 
the congregation animals to be offered to God, a sin-offering 
and a burnt-offering, and a meat-offering on the altar, as an 
atonement for all. The flesh was placed on the altar : " and 
the glory of the Lord appeared unto all the people, and 
there came a fire out from before the Lord, and consumed 
upon the altar the burnt-offering and the fat : which when 
the people saw they shouted and fell on their faces.^^ 

But a terrible calamity broke now suddenly and most 
fearfully upon the family of Aaron ! We know that long 
afterward the good Eli, judge over Israel, was afflicted with 
wickedness among his children ; and many other good men 
have been so afflicted : was it that now these two young 
men were under the influence of wine? — for so an injunction 
immediately afterward may intimate; or what was the 
reason for their act ? which was an evil one. Here, now, 
on this most solemn occasion, while the glory of God was 
specially in the Tabernacle and the people were on their 
faces before it, Nadab and Abihu took their censers and in 
them '^ strange fire" — not from the altar — and also incense ; 
and they had started to offer the latter presumptuously, when 
^^ there went out fire from before the Lord, and devoured 
them, and they died before the Lord.^^ 



388 LIFE'SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

The spectators might well stand aghast, as they did, at 
the sj)ectacle. Aaron and his two remaining sons, Eleazar 
and Ithamar who were to succeed the deceased, were com- 
manded not to make the usual outward demonstrations, 
probably because it might seem to be an official censure ou 
the Divine act ; " for the anointing oil of the Lord,^^ they 
were told, " is upon you ;" but the rest of the congregation 
were allowed the usual wailing over the dead. To the High 
Priest the heavenly injunction was given, '' Do not drink 
wine nor strong drink, nor thy sons with thee when ye go 
into the Tabernacle of the congregation, lest ye die ; it shall 
be a statute for ever throughout your generations : and that 
ye may put difference between holy and unholy, and be- 
tween unclean and clean /^ 

Another instance of severe retribution came not long 
afterward, adapted to make a strong impression on the 
minds of the people with respect to the reverence due to 
God. A man '' blasphemed the name of the Lord, and 
cursed.^^ He was not a full Israelite, being the son of a 
woman of this people by an Egyptian father, and probably 
belonged to that " mixed multitude^^ who had come with 
them in the Exodus, and were probably always more diffi- 
cult to control than their own people, and apt to engender 
mischief. This man had a quarrel with an Israelite, and in 
the contest with him, broke out in blasphemy of the name 
of God. He was seized and put in confinement until 
a decision in the case could be received at the Tabernacle. 
We might indeed expect some strong example among a {)eo- 
ple so mixed as these were, so ignorant and ready to turn in 
rebellion against God. The sentence was that the man 
should be taken without the camp ; those who had heard 
the blasphemy were there to lay their hands on his head, 
and then he was to be stoned to death by the congregation. 
The offence was thenceforward entered on the record, as an 
act to be considered in the Hebrew law as worthy of death. 



THE TABERNACLE. 389 

During the progress of these events, the great leader, 
under the influence of the Divine inspiration, was complet- 
ing that system of laws for the government of the Israelites, 
which from that time forward made them so unique and 
remarkable a people, quite distinct from all other nations, 
and gave them an impress which has come down to our own 
time. 

Their government was to be a Theocracy^ — God was their 
king. There were to be subordinate officers, and many 
subordinate regulations, often very minute ; but through all 
this was the great feature of a theocracy, in which God 
was the Ruler supreme. 

This was indeed a strong demonstration of himself, by 
the Creator, before all the world. It w^as the object in all 
that had gone before ; it was to be the object in all yet to 
come,-^(Tod manifest before the world. The whole world 
sunk in idolatry, was a continued proof how much this was 
needed. Down to our day, indeed, we have proof yet re- 
maining of such need. And the value of such demonstration 
then made, and of the key which it gives to us for unlocking 
and reading all history, is widely and clearly manifest to 
every thinking mind. In this manifestation of himself before 
the world, God employed the Jewish nation, making use of 
miracles, and strange, mysterious power, and inspirations 
of prophets and writers. Then at last came the manifesta- 
tion of the Deity, not by a cloud as at the Tabernacle, but 
by Himself in human form, the Perfect One, the Sacrifice 
for us through the mighty power of Divine love I After 
that the Jewish nation ceased to be. They are continued as 
distinct individuals, and are still, everywhere, witnesses for 
God, but of His retributive power ; for in crucifying Christ, 
their rulers had prayed, '^ His blood be on us and on our 
children.^^ Therefore, though this people are still a demon- 
stration respecting God, it is one of retribution ; and we see 
them '' scattered and peeled and a by-word,^^ as he had 
33* 



3go LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

declared they would be if they should forsake him. The 
strangest of all histories indeed it is ! as it might indeed 
have been expected to be, since God is its author, and his 
government over all, and his love for all, its subject. Every 
Jew, scattered as those people are over all the earth, is yet a 
leaf in that book ; and all men may read. 

We revert here to a subject already glanced at, but need- 
ing further remark, namely, the surprise sometimes ex- 
pressed by critics at the fact that in this Jewish polity, 
drawn out by Moses in so much detail, the subject of the 
souPs immortality, with the vast amount of powerful 
motives to be drawn from this, is unnoticed. Bishop War- 
burton has even deduced from this silence a singular argu- 
ment for establishing the divine legation of this great 
leader.^ A very probable reason, however, for such neglect, 



^ Bishop Warburton's " Divine Legation of Moses Demonstrated." We 
give a summary of his argument, using his own words : 

" We erect our demonstration on these three very clear and simple pro- 
positions : 

" I. That to inculcate the doctrine of a future state of rewards and pun- 
ishments, is necessary to the well-being of civil society. 

" II. That all mankind, especially the most wise and learned nations of 
antiquity, have concurred in believing and teaching that this doctrine was 
of such use to civil society. 

" III. That the doctrine of a future state of rewards and punishments is 
not to be found in, nor did make part of, the Mosaic dispensation. 

*' IV. That therefore the Law of Moses is of Divine original, which one 
or both of the following syllogisms will evince: 

" 1. Whatsoever religion and society have no future state for their sup- 
port, must be supported by an extraordinary Providence. The Jewish 
religion and society had no future state for tlieir support. Tlierefore the 
Jewish religion and society were supported by an extraordinary Providence. 

"Again, 2. The ancient lawgivers universally believed that such religion 
could be supported only by an extraordinary Providence. Moses, an 
ancient lawgiver, versed in all the wisdom of Egypt, purposely instituted 
such a religion : 

"Therefore Moses believed his religion was supported by an extraordi- 
nary Providence." 



THE TABERNACLE, 39 1 

seems clearly to lie in the necessity of avoiding everything 
that would sweep the multitudes back into the Egyptian 
superstitions. Among these, the observances for the dead, 
joined in close connection with Osiris the judge of the 
dead, formed, as has been already noticed, a large part of the 
religious and domestic life of the Egyptians. The mind 
of any individual whatever must have been confounded 
immediately, in trying to penetrate into that subject. To 
their priests it was one full of mysticisms ; to their people 
it was knit inextricably with Osiris, whom it made in their 
minds, as he was in their sculptured temples, the great god 
to be honored, and whose favor was to be sought. To these 
Israelites, to whom all this had been familiar from childhood, 
and who were now ready to rush back into such super- 
stitions with that momentum which love and reverence for 
their own dead must have produced, it would now have 
been dangerous to give any such impulse or encouragement; 
and it was safer altogether to avoid the topic, leaving 
the immense amount of niotives for right action that can be 
drawn from the souFs immortality, to the operation of their 
already formed belief that the soul does not perish at death. 
This belief they doubtless all entertained. Moses was content 
to let the matter so rest, rather than to stir up thoughts that 
might carry them rapidly back into idolatry. His own pur- 
pose was now a single and simple one, namely, to lift them 
up to a faith in the true God and obedience to Him. How 
fully they were imbued with the Egyptian superstitions 
and idolatries, we see from Joshua xxiv. 14, and God^s 
word in Ezekiel xx. 7, 8, and from their quick action in the 
case of the golden calf here at Sinai. 

Indeed, the difficulties in legislating for this people, so 
crude in intellect, so debased in habits by their long slavery, 
so ready to become insolent in self-sufficiency, even by rea- 
son of God's constant favor to them, and at the same time 
so ready to desert him for any false gods, must have been 



392 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

felt to be almost insurmountable — especially as Moses had 
no physical force to sustain his authority among them, and 
could only appeal to their convictions, which seem often to 
have had very little influence over their conduct. Only 
one power he had in addition to their convictions, and this 
arose from these outward manifestations of Jehovah, such 
as at Sinai — the thunder and lightning on the mountain 
top, the cloud and glory at the Tabernacle, and the retribu- 
tions following on their misdeeds. Yet, just after the man- 
ifestations on Sinai, they had hastened to make an imitation 
of the Egyptian Mnevis, and in nakedness had danced 
before the golden calf! 

He had indeed a difficult task. 

His great system of laws cannot, of course, be drawn out 
in this book, and the reader is referred for them to the Bible 
itself: we only glance, in conclusion, at an order for three 
special observances in each year ; the Passover festival, com- 
memorative of the night scene at the time of their deliver- 
ance from slavery; the Feast of Tabernacles, to be a 
reminder of their present journeying and its events; and 
the Feast of Pentecost, or a general thanksgiving to God 
for the blessings of the year. 



CHAPTER XLI. 
THE MOVEMENT FROM SINAL 

THE cloud rose from the Tabernacle. It was the signal 
for a movomoirt ! The signal was a welcome one ; for 
inactivity had become wearisome to those great multitudes, 
among whom, since the Tabernacle had been finished and 



THE MOVEMENT FROM SINAI, 393 

tlie novelty of the sacrifices and of the new forms had passed 
away, there had been little to occupy the mind. 

The manner of movement in their future journeyings 
and the plan of their encampment when the ground would 
admit of it, were now all well systematized and written out. 
In encamping, the Tabernacle was to have the central place. 
In front of it, that is, on the east, were to be, after a sufficient 
vacant interval, the tents of Moses and Aaron. On its 
right were to be the Kohathites, numbering eight thousand 
six hundred males from one year old and upward : and it 
was the duty of these to transport and take care of the ark, 
the table, candlesticks, altars, and other appurtenances of the 
Tabernacle and court : on the left, the Merarites (six thou- 
sand two hundred males), who had charge of the pillars, 
bars, sockets, boards, etc. ; in the rear, the Gershonites (seven 
thousand five hundred males), who were to transport the 
coverings and hangings and similar things belonging to the 
Tabernacle and its court. These were all families of the 
tribe of Levi, and therefore particularly devoted to the 
religious services. Outside of all these w^as the general en- 
campment of tribes ; and beginning at the north-east and 
going westward, were Asher, Daniel and Naphtali ; then 
south, Manasseh, Ephraim and Benjamin ; then east, 
Simeon, Heuben and Gad ; and then north, Issachar, Judah 
and Zebulun. A numbering of the tribes had just been 
made, which showed that those from twenty years and 
upward, who were able to go forth to war, amounted to 
603,550: this was independently of the Levites, whose 
males, twenty years and upward, were twenty-two thousand 
in number. The whole encampment, if made according to 
the plan thus drawn out, it is computed, would require 
about twelve miles on each side ; consequently it was only 
on wide open ground that such an arrangement could be 
carried into effect. The surplus of contributions which had 
been offered and declined at the construction of the Taber- 



394 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT, 

nacle, had been afterward called for, when the altar for 
sacrifices was ready for use. Among the offerings of gold 
and silver, and cattle, now freely made, were also draught- 
oxen, which, with wagons for carrying the coarser portions 
of the Tabernacle and court, assisted materially in the labor 
of transportation. 

A religious ceremony was used when the ark was 
moved, and again when it came to a halting-place; in 
the former case Moses said, '^ Rise up. Lord, and let thine 
enemies be scattered ; and let them that hate thee flee before 
thee:'^ and in the latter, ^^ Return, O Lord, unto the many 
thousands of Israel.^' 

The vast company was again in motion. The neighbor- 
hood of Sinai had become like a home to them ; so familiar 
was now every spot there, and so filled with various associa- 
tions of friendly intercourse among themselves and of 
mutual labors. Every crag of the awful mountain and of 
the surrounding peaks had been gazed upon, till it had be- 
come like an old acquaintance. The more restless among 
them had penetrated the defiles leading in all directions 
among the frowning precipices, and had climbed the heights 
of the mountain now called Jebel Catharin, immediately on 
the south-west from Sinai, and from its peak, eight thousand 
two hundred and seventy-two feet above the sea, or two 
thousand seven hundred and seventy above the eneamjMuent, 
had gazed on the wide prospect which it commanded. 
This embraces the immense billowy masses of mountains 
spread far around ; and beyond these, on the west, the Gulf 
of Suez and its African shore ; on the east, portions of the 
Gulf of Akabah, and on the north, the range of Et Tih 
beyond which is seen to stretch, far onward, the level, 
sandy desert. The whole scene exhibited so widely before 
the spectator is very grand, but also very gloomy and 
desolate. If in all directions, the prospect to those 
spectators was repulsive, it was particularly so toward the 



I 



THE MOVEMENT FROM SINAI. 395 

east, where the mountain masses while lacking the lofty, 
stern grandeur of those in the rest of the peninsula, are 
even more crowded, and are, says Eobinson, "a mass 
of black, abrupt, naked, weather-worn peaks, — a fitting 
spot where the very genius of desolation might erect his 
horrid throne/^ 

Yet now, when the encampment did move at last, it went 
directly into this forbidding region. So at least, we may 
infer from incidents on the journey which will be noticed as 
they occur. We have only the information in the Record, 
that they " departed from the mount of the Lord three 
days' journey;'' but it seems probable that they passed 
along Wady Sheikh eastwardly for a little way, and then, 
when this turns northwardly, left it and entered among the 
wadys by which this '^ sea of mountains," as Robinson 
calls it, is penetrated toward the east. 

There were immediate complainings among the people 
(Num. xi. 1). These complaints seem to have been in the 
outskirts of the company, among the hangers-on of camps, 
such as always belong to large moving bodies, and form the 
restless, troublesome spirits of a community. Just such 
would have climbed the heights of Jebel Catharin, and 
would have taken cognizance of this maze of frightful cliffs 
lying eastwardly, with an expressed hope that their way 
would not lie thitherward; and now that it did plunge into 
these ravines, although led by the pillar of cloud, these 
stragglers in spite of its guidance were beginning to make 
mischief by their forebodings and complaints. Very soon, 
amid the toils and discomforts of the new movement, such 
murmurings would become contagious, and they were 
already beginning to spread, when suddenly the com- 
plainers were swept off by a divine visitation. We know not 
how, in what form, this came, more than that ^* the fire of the 
Lord burnt among them, and consumed them that were in 
the uttermost parts of the camp." A cry of distress and 



39^ LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT, 

alarm was raised by the survivors ; and then, on their appli- 
cation, Moses prayed for them, and " the fire was quenched.'^ 
He called the place Taberah, '^A Burning/^ in commemora- 
tion of the event. 

But not long afterward a general mutinous commotion 
spread through the camp ; and the spirit of the great leader, 
though he knew God was on his side, was temporarily 
beat down in utter discouragement. The cry now was for 
animal food. The commotion began among "the mixed 
multitude'' that came out with the true Israelites from 
Egypt ; a set of men from whom troubles might be naturally 
expected, for they felt themselves less amenable to the 
laws of God then did the others. But the complaint now 
found strong answering sympathies among the whole com- 
munity. During all the time at Sinai the manna had 
continued to descend at night, and a wholesome bread had 
been made from it, and the people had the greatest abund- 
ance of this food, but the sameness of it for nearly a year, 
with little else, had become tiresome, and the gathering of 
the manna began to be mingled with a longing for animal 
food, which soon took an aggravated form. This longing was 
now mingled with unusual fatigue. The protracted time of 
their encampment had enervated th.eir strength, and they were 
less able to endure the trials of journeying than at the first. 
Discomforts, if not real, still imaginary, multiplied upon 
them by the way. The old and the feeble, and the children, 
soon began to raise cries of distress from fatigue, and the 
mixed multitude, ready to produce sedition, insinuated the 
grievance of having to bear it without strengthening food. 
It was insinuated that this was only the beginning. " Look," 
might be said by the complainers, " look at the mountains 
before you, and the frightful ravines : you are already 
fainting: hen* will surely bo your graves: better far to 
have died amid the variety of good things in Egypt: our 
soul is dried away : there is nothing at all besides this manna 



THE MOVEMENT FROM SINAI, 397 

hejore our eyesP People under the present trials, and the 
prospects for the future, broke down and wept, and even 
strong men felt the contagion. An animal desire, when the 
• thoughts are allowed to run on it, grows at once in intensity: 
" Moses heard the people weep throughout their families, 
every man in the door of his tent/^ 

He himself raised a bitter cry, — not like theirs for such 
indulgence, but in despair. What should he do with such 
a people as this? He was ready to abandon hope. He 
murmured even against God. Indeed the burden that he 
had been bearing alone was very heavy for any one man, 
and even his large intellect and strong moral nature were 
staggering under it. It was such a bitter thing to have the 
whole of these complaints directed against him, as if he 
were the cause of all this suffering, and as if the congrega- 
tion were not led on by this pillar of cloud and of fire. 
And these were a people for whom he himself had perilled 
so much and done so much ! His heart sunk within him 
utterly, but he had still strength left to cry to God. It was, 
however, almost a cry of reproach : 

"Wherefore hast thou aflSicted thy servant? and where- 
fore have I not found favor in thy sight, that thou layest 
the burden of all this upon me ? Have I conceived all this 
people ? Have I begotten them, that thou shouldest say unto 
me. Carry them in thy bosom, as a nursing-father beareth 
the sucking child, unto the land which thou swearest unto 
their fathers ? Whence should I have flesh to give unto all 
this people ? for they weep unto me, saying. Give us flesh, 
that we may eat. I am not able to bear all this people 
alone, because it is too heavy for me. And if thou deal 
thus with me, kill me, I pray thee, out of hand, if I 
have found favor in thy sight; and let me not see my 
wretchedness.^^ 

It was a plaintive cry unworthy of Moses, who had seen 
so many manifestations of God and of the power and care 

34 



39S LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

exercised by him ; and it shows that his mind, great as it 
Avas, had become overstrained by the burdens it had been 
compelled to bear. The answer was one of strong decision, 
reaching decidedly to all the case. He was to collect the 
seventy elders into the Tabernacle, and God would manifest 
himself there before them, and^^I will take of the spirit 
which is upon thee, and I will put it upon them : and they 
shall bear the burden of the people with thee, that thou 
bear it not thyself alone.^^ There was a promise also that 
on the morrow flesh would be sent, sufficient in quantity 
for a whole month : finally people should loathe it ; for it 
was the divine purpose to send with it a plague as a punish- 
ment for their perverseness. 

The seventy were assembled, and God in manifest pre- 
sence put a spirit of wisdom and prophecy into them ; and 
in their exhibitions of the latter, it was felt by the people 
that the responsibility in the future was divided between 
Moses and these men. During the day, also a strong wind 
brought immense flocks of quails from the direction of the 
eastern sea. They flew so low — only a few feet above the 
^earth — as to be easily taken ; and through the day and night 
they were captured throughout the camp and in its neigh- 
borhood. A writer, Maillet, speaking of Egypt, says that 
in certain seasons, when birds come there in great quanti- 
ties, "the people catch and pluck them and bury them in 
the burning sand for a few minutes, and thus prepare them 
for use.^' But while the Israelites were yet in the first ex- 
cesses of their eating, disease broke out among them, per- 
haps from their excess ; and " the Lord smote the j)eople 
witli a very great plague. The place received from their 
leader the name of Kihroth-hailaavalij " Graves of Lusting," 
to be a reminder of the people thus buried there. 

Their next campiiig-placc was ITazeroth : and as there is 
now eastward from Siiiai, at the distance of four or five 
days' journey from tliat mountain, a fountain called by the 



THE MOVEMENT FROM SINAI. 399 

Arabs el-Hudhei^a, the similarity of names seems to point 
out this spot as that aUuded to in the Sacred Record.^ It 
is one of the reasons above hinted at for believing that the 
Israelites took this easterly course; and with it may be con- 
nected the question put by Moses in the recent transactions, 
(Num. xi. 22), " Shall all the fish of the sea be gathered 
together for them f^ by which, and the subsequent events, we 
may infer that they were near the eastern gulf of the Red Sea. 
This spot at the fountain of el-HMhera is still a favorite 
stopping-place for the Arabs for water and for feeding their 
camels on the verdure around. 

A strange and most unexpected event comes now before 
us at this place ; — a rising up against Moses by Aaron and 
Miriam. Jealousy was the cause of it. He had married, 
as we know, a Midianite woman, Zipporah, the daughter of 
an Arabian Sheikh, and she was ostensibly the cause ^ of the 
present trouble in the family. Aaron may have felt him- 
self slighted in not being numbered among the seventy; 
and Miriam, who seems to have been the chief mover in 
this trouble, may have been offended by having her own 
consequence as the sister of the leader not sufficiently recog- 
nized, perhaps overshadowed by that of the wife. '^ Hath 
the Lord, indeed, spoken only by Moses,^^ they said ; " hath 
he not spoken also by us V^ Their brother on this occasion 
made no complaint to God ; but bore it in the quiet of a 
great and patient man.^ But God called him and the sister 
and brother, directing them to come to the Tabernacle, 
where the cloud now manifested his especial presence. The 
two offenders were audibly reproved by the heavenly voice ; 



^ The reader is referred to the general map on page 316, No. 8. 

2 She is called Ethiopian in our version : in the original it is Cushite, 
and Cush appears sometimes to designate parts of Arabia : see Hab. iii. 7; 2 
Chron. xxi. 16 ; Gen. x. 8. 

^ Our version makes him call himself " very meek above all men," but 
the original will signify, just as well, afflicted, humble, &c. See Ps. x. 12, 17. 



400 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

and then the cloud lifted again, no longer filling the sacred 
chamber. But when they came to look on Miriam, to 
their horror they saw that she was " leprous, white as snow." 
Aaron now interceded with Moses, and then Moses with 
God. She was promised restoration from heaven, but it 
was directed that she should be shut out from communion 
with the camp for seven days. The camp remained at 
Hazeroth till her exile from it and her mourning were 
completed. 



CHAPTER XLII. 
AT KADESH'BARNEA— SPIES SENT OUT, 

WE are now about to follow these multitudes into a new 
region, and as their present advent to it resulted in 
making it their home for thirty-eight years, and it was to be 
the burial-place by doom of a large part of the host, we will 
endeavor to get a clear idea of the country.^ 

From the north-eastern gulf of the Red Sea, — the gulf of 
Akabah — there extends up quite to the Dead Sea a broad 
valley called Wady Arabah, from seven to ten miles wide 
and one hundred and twenty miles in length. It is gen- 
erally pretty smooth, but ascends gradually as it proceeds 
northwardly from Akabah, — the present town at the head 
of the gulf, — till within fifteen miles of the Dead Sea, when 
there is a sudden descent of one hundred and fifty feet at a 
spot where a range of cliffs passes quite across the valley. 
Formerly the opinion was common that the waters of the 
Jordan, after flowing over the basin at the Dead Sea, had 
discharged themselves originally by this valley into the gulf 



1 The reader will do well to refer again to the general map, p. 316. 



AT KADESH-BARNEA— SPIES SENT OUT, 401 

of Akabah^ but geological facts are now supposed to be 
decisive against such belief. Dr. Olin speaks of Wady 
Arabah as " a broad and fertile plain f but the appearance 
of fertility we may believe to arise chiefly from its contrast 
with the utterly bare mountains and the desert bordering it 
on the west. At the eastern side of this valley rise the very 
picturesque and sometimes beautiful mountains of Edom. 
On its west is a region which we must notice more in detail, 
for it has an important place in the history of the Israelites. 
In that direction is what is now called the Desert et-Tih, 
formerly doubtless " The Wilderness of Paran.^^ 

The whole desert region extending from Wady Arabah 
to the Mediterranean^ although irregular in its outline, may 
be said to be one hundred and fifty statute miles from north 
to south, and the same from east to west. The rock is, uni- 
versally, limestone, but the surface of the ground, except in 
the few places where mountains or precipices break in on its 
uniformity, is a coarse, hard gravel, covered with black 
flints and drift. The whole of this large region, of twenty- 
two thousand five hundred square miles, is with slight 
exceptions a nearly even and barren waste. It is drained 
by two wadys and their confluents, one (the larger) being 
the Wady el-Arish, anciently " The river of Egypt,^^ open- 
ing into the Mediterranean in lat. 31^ 5^ north: the other, 
the Wady el-Jerafeh opening into the valley of el- Arabah. 
These wadys, however, it must be remembered are only very 
shallow and broad depressions in the ground, just sufficient 
to collect and carry off the waters in rainy seasons, and at 
all other times entirely dry. - 

If the reader will suppose himself to start at Beersheba, 
and go south, he will pass over a country in general declin- 
ing very gently, covered at first with grass and shrubs, which 
soon, however, cease, leaving only the bare, hard earth 
sprinkled over thickly with black pebbles, the whole surface 
scorched by the fiery sun. Thus onward for about fifty 
34- 



402 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT, 

miles, the ground still all the while slightly declining ; and 
then he will come to Wady el-Arish, beyond which there is 
an easy upward slope with a surface similar to the other, 
and extending on for about one hundred miles. In this long 
distance the ascent has become considerable, and finally it 
reaches an elevation of four thousand three hundred and 
twenty-tw^o feet above the sea. Then, there is a sudden, wall- 
like descent, forming the apparent ridge or hill showing 
itself eastwardly from Suez, and from the line of travel 
taken by the Israelites, from the crossing of the Red Sea to 
Sinai. Below this wall of descent is a belt of sandstone, 
and then succeeds the mountainous granite region of the 
peninsula. 

Such are the general features of this great desert between 
Wady Arabah and the Mediterranean ; but they are varied 
occasionally by bare hills, where the limestone crops out, and 
with its garish whiteness blinds still more the pained and 
wearied eyes. Another exception exists in successions of 
cliffs or rapid descents at the eastern edge of the desert, 
where it sinks down to the level of Wady Arabah. One 
of these cliffs was soon to have a terrible distinction in the 
history of the Israelites. We will only add now that the 
sudden wall-like descent from the desert, looking like a ridge 
as seen from below, is, while continuing parallel to the 
Gulf of Suez, called Jebcl Rahah ; then it curves round 
more to the eastward under the name of Jebel et-Tih ; then 
it divides, and a part, branching off, goes under the name of 
Jebel Ojmeh more to the north. 

We now try to follow the great hosts led on by their 
pillar of cloud, but we do it amid many perplexities ; for 
the region in which they travelled for some time has few 
distinctive marks by which we may have a clue to their 
course. Tlie scenes at the close of tlie last chapter were at 
Hazeroth, and the i)resent name of the fountain el-Hfid- 
hera, with its position, seems to be a guide to us from Sinai 



AT KADBSH-BARNEA— SPIES SENT OUT, 403 

eastwardly as far as that place. " Then/^ we are told, ^' the 
people removed from Hazeroth, and pitched in the wilder- 
ness of Paran/^ Sixteen miles northward from el- 
Hudhera is now a remarkable fountain called simply el-Ain 
(the fountain) J the water of which is abundant and pure, and 
its neighborhood is so green and beautiful as to be likened, 
though in an inferior degree, to the " gem of the desert^^ in 
Feiran. In the map published by Lepsius a deep valley 
leads from el-Hudhera to this fountain, and the distance to 
it, sixteen miles or a day^s journey, seems to point it out as 
their next camping-spot. Eastward from this and also from 
sl-Hudhera, and quite along the border of the Gulf of 
A.kabah, the whole region is a succession of irregular 
granite mountains full of difficult passes : but northward of 
el-Ain and twenty miles distant is the ascent of Et-Tih, 
having climbed which, the Israelites would find themselves 
in the more open country at the commencement of the 
desert which we have just described. There they would 
very soon strike the Wady Jerafeh ; and as this journey was 
in May, we may suppose that by following this valley they 
would have grass, and by slight digging might also procure 
water. Robinson crossed Wady Jerafeh, in his journey 
from Akabah to Beersheba, and says " it exhibits traces of a 
large volume of water in the rainy season ; and is full of 
herbs and shrubs, with many Seyal and Turfe trees.^^ 

We may believe therefore, that the region drained by the 
Jerfi,feh is the " wilderness of Paran^^ to which the Israelites 
resorted after leaving Ilazeroth, and that we have thus 
traced them well on toward their clearly-designated stopping- 
place, Kadesh-barnea, in a region which soon became to 
them so eventful. Wady Jerafeh conducts by long and 
easy descents to the Wady Arabah ; and soon after reaching 
the latter brings us to the most celebrated fountain in all 
the Arabah, the Ain el- Weibeh, still eagerly resorted to by 
the Arabs in all their journeyings in this region. This 



404 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT, 

spot IS universally conceded to be the Kadesh-barnea of 
the Scriptures. 

Here the Israelites rested. It was, indeed, highly neces- 
sary that they should rest and enter into mature delibera- 
tions about the immediate future: for they were now but 
a few miles from the borders of Canaan. Beersheba was 
only fifty-two miles distant from them toward the north- 
west, and Hebron sixty miles to the north. Of the people 
in Canaan, and of the country, little could be known to these 
numerous invading hosts. Abraham had lived there four hun- 
dred and thirty years previously, and God had then promised 
the country to his descendants. The same promises, they 
knew, had been repeated to Isaac and Jacob : but any traditions 
that had come down from Jacob's emigration, two hundred 
and fifteen years in the past, had grown faint, and these, his 
descendants, were now full of earnest curiosity respecting 
this their destined home. Coming as they did in such large 
numbers, they could not be considered as any other than a 
race of invaders before whom the inhabitants of the country 
would have either to retire in a body, or set themselves up 
in determined resistance : for the land would not be able 
to contain both. Which would it be? What was the 
nature of those people, — fierce or gentle? Had they 
cities and were those cities fortified ? What was the 
country itself, destined, they were told, to be their future 
liabitation ? These were questions which were pressing 
hard upon the vast multitudes now encamped about K:\desh, 
and were filling them with very deep solicitude. True it was 
that God had jiromised the land to their forefathers, and 
also that the mysterious power which had delivered them- 
selves from Egypt and had given, them bread from heaven, 
and had led them on by the cloud and fiery pillar, could now 
afford them any needed lielp ; but this power had also 
shown itself to them in retributive forms, and they knew 
how greatly, from their rebellions against God, they were 



AT KADESH-BARNEA—SPIES SENT OUT. 405 

deserving of retribution. Indeed one of the most terrible 
things in their present condition, with possible trials before 
them, was the dimming of their faith in the certainty of 
God's favor to them individually, since they knew that they 
had forfeited his favor, and that he was a God to punish 
as well as to bless. Several times he had already threatened 
to sweep their whole nation from the earth, and Moses had 
saved them only by humble and earnest entreaty, and by 
representations that, in such a case, the Egyptians would 
triumph and heathenism be glorified. What was coming 
now ? Here they were on the edge of Canaan. What 
would be the results of such an approach to it evidently 
for invasion? A great trial was before the Israelites. 
It became them to be cautious. They were indeed full of 
anxiety. 

So they gathered around Moses here at Kadesh, and asked 
him to send some of their number up into the country, to 
examine it, and to make report.^ Divine directions were 
given to the same effect, and twelve of the head men were 
now selected, one from each tribe, to go forward and ^^ to spy 
out the land/^ Among these were Caleb of the tribe of 
Judah ; and from that of Ephraim, Oshea, whose name 
Moses changed to Jehoshua. The directions given were, 
" Get you up this way, southward, and go up into the 
mountain : and see the land, what it is ; and the people that 
dwelleth therein, whether they be strong or weak, few or 
many ; and what the land is that they dwell in, whether it 
be good or bad ; and what cities they be that they dwell in, 
whether in tents or in strongholds ; and what the land is, 
whether it be fat or lean, whether there be wood therein, or 
not. And be ye of good courage, and bring of the fruit of 
the land.'' 

The multitudes saw them start off on their dangerous 



1 See Deut. i. 22. 



4o6 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

mission ; watched them as their forms disappeared among 
the hills adjoining the camp, and then turned to speculate 
further in their minds as resi)ected events soon to be di- 
vulged, and also to look more widely at the region in which 
they were situated. The Wady Arabah is at that spot 
about ten miles wide ; it has for its eastern boundary the 
mountains of Edom, rising in successive increasing eleva- 
tions, till they attain an altitude of about three thousand 
feet. They are diversified, and frequently rich in verdure. 
Nearly opposite the encampment of the Israelites they are 
pierced by the large Wady Ghuweir, fed by streams, and 
to this day one of the most productive spots in all that 
region. To this richness and beauty of Edom the western 
side of the Arabah forms an entire and gloomy contrast ; for 
here the mountains are bare and utterly barren, apparently 
repelling every attempt to gain any cheerfulness of hope in 
that direction. Yet over them was now to be the road to 
Canaan, the promised land. The Israelites gazed upon 
them with forebodings. Beyond them were probably ene- 
mies to be encountered ; nature itself seemed also to be there, 
rising up in forbllding aspects. 

The fountain el-Weibeh, whence they were now drawing 
their supplies of water, is on the west side of Wady Ara- 
bah, just where the ascent of these barren mountains com- 
mences. Its name, Kadcsh (holy), is proof that it was an 
important place in those ancient times, as it is also now, for 
it is the only good watering-place in the whole extent of the 
Arabah, one hundred and twenty miles long. But it owes 
its celebrity rather to the scarcity of water in that region 
than to any beauty in itself. There are three fountains 
issuing from the chalky rock of which the slope is com- 
posed. " They are," says Robinson, " some rods apart, 
running out in small streams from the foot of a low rise of 
the ground at the edge of the hills. The water is not 
abundant ; and in the two northernmost sources has a sickly 



A MUTINY AND CARNAGE, 407 

hue, like most of the desert fountains, with a taste of sul- 
phuretted hydrogen. But the southernmc^t consists of three 
small rills of limpid, good water, flowing out of a small 
excavation in the rock. The soft, chalky stone has crumbled 
away, forming a semi-circular ledge about six feet high 
around the spring, and now a few feet distant from it. The 
intermediate space is at present occupied by earth, but the 
rock apparently once extended out, so that the water actu- 
ally issued from its base.^^ The Arabah opposite is ^^every- 
w^here sprinkled with herbs and shrubs,^^ and just below the 
fountains '' is a jungle of coarse grass and canes, and a few 
palm trees, presenting at a distance the appearance of full 
verdure, but proving near at hand to be marshy, and full 
of bogs.^^ 

It is probable that the tents of the Israelites occupied the 
region not only about the fountain, but the heights back of 
it on the west, where the occupants would have a better 
temperature than in the bottom of Wady Arabah, shut in 
and with reverberations of heat from both sides. Two or 
three millions of people would require much room, and we 
may suppose their encampment to have stretched for some 
miles up the hill-sides, and on the level spots, to the west of 
the fountain. This will help to elucidate events which 
were now about to transpire. 



CHAPTER XLIII. 
A MUTINY AND CARNAGE, 

T^ORTY days the spies were absent; and through all that 
J- time there was deep anxiety, with many surmisings, 
many hopes and anxieties, and resolves also made for the 



4o8 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

Map showing the region of the Mutiny and Slaughter. 




6 10 FDRliflh Mllea. 

1. Wady .7(-r:if(']i. 

2. Kl-Woibrh, believed to bo KudoHli-barnea. 

3. Hill fjf-.SM/a/i— plaro of the CrtrnjiRO. 

4. inn of Salt. 

6. S<mthorn end «>f Dead Sea. 

6. Wady Ohuweir, probably the " king's highway" into Edom. 

7. Mount Ilor. 

8. Pr<^wMit niinH of Petra. 
A, A, A. Wa.ly Arnbah. 



A MUTINY AND CARNAGE, 409 

emergencies that might arise. It was a time of idleness in 
the camp, and idleness always, especially in so large and 
mixed a multitude, is productive of mischief Now that 
danger might also be near them, they thought and talked 
much about their safety, and the comparative abundance on 
the green plains of Egypt. Green plains had become only 
a seemingly remote remembrance to them ; and their eyes 
longed, if only for the sight of green turf to give its refresh- 
ment to their senses once more : but instead of greenness, 
the mountains back of them and toward Canaan, showed 
only crag after crag in utter bareness, bleached white by 
centuries of burning sun. '' Was this the land,^^ some of 
them asked scofRngly, '^ for which their leader had decoyed 
them away from their safe homes and green pastures on the 
banks of the Nile?^^ Their encampment now was only 
thirty miles from the southern end of the Dead Sea ; and if 
any of them, as is probable, wandered to it, during these 
forty days, and tasted its waters, they found that in taste 
the Nile had here its very extremity of contrast ; this water 
was far less drinkable than even that of the Red Sea ; was 
perfectly nauseous ! And onward to the northward, beyond 
where their eyes could distinguish any boundaries, continued 
to stretch that same dull, leaden sea. 

Thus, we may easily conceive, how ready for violent 
eruption was the feeling among the people, idle, agitated, 
brooding over past enjoyments, and vexed with present dis- 
comforts; and how sensitive were the nerves of the vast 
multitudes, when, at the expiration of forty days, they saw 
the spies return. These men had done their assigned work 
thoroughly ; for they had been as far as the extreme northern 
boundaries of Canaan, lying along the flanks of Lebanon ; 
and after making themselves acquainted with the agricul- 
tural wealth and military strength of the whole country, 
had brought back specimens of its fruits. Among these 
were grapes, a single cluster of w^hich was long enough to 
35 



4IO LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

require that it should be carried on a staff between two 
men, to keep it from trailing on the ground.^ The account 
which they gave of the productiveness of the country was 
most satisfactory ; but what they said of its military capa- 
bilities was entirely the reverse. Of the land, they said 
" it surely floweth with milk and honey ; and this is the 
fruit of it. Nevertheless, the people be strong that dwell 
in the land, and the cities are w^alled, and very great ; and 
moreover, we saw the children of Anak there. The Amal- 
ekites dwell in the land of the south : and the Hittites, and 
the Jebusites, and the Amorites, dwell in the mountains ; 
and the Canaanites dwell by the sea, and by the coast of 
Jordan.^^ 

There was a great commotion throughout all this great 
host. Among such multitudes the timid are always more 
numerous than the brave ; and fear is always more conta- 
gious than courage. The report about the giants, children 
of Anak, — such men as the company had never yet seen — 
and about the walled cities, appalled the people. The brave 
Caleb, and doubtless also Joshua, stood up before them with 
a different aspect, and a courageous cry ; " Let us go up at 
once and possess it ; for we are wtII able to overcome it.'^ 
He was overborne by the testimony of the other ten. 
Terror had taken possession of these, and was now height- 
ened by the general spread of fear. '' There we saw the 
giants, the sons of Anak, which come of the giants : and 
we were in our own sight as grasshoppers, and so we were 
in their sight,'' was rejicated by the ten dismayed spies. 

Through all the night there was weeping everywhere in 



* The author of UiIh work hrw himself piirdiased at Jaffa a cluster two 
feet lonp: on mentioning this to other officers of the same ship (the U. S. 
Bhip Delaware), they said that they had seen clusters still longer. The 
grapes on it were not large or thickly clustered, hut this cluster would 
require to he carried in the manner here specified, in order to keep it from 
being injured in transportation, or greatly wearying the person carrying it. 



A MUTINY AND CARNAGE, 41 1 

the camp. Those Eastern nations are always a demonstra- 
tive people; and the Israelites on this occasion felt that 
there was no reason for restraint, but the contrary. Dark- 
ness, too, is always suggestive of increased causes of alarm ; 
and terrors w^hich in daylight men can brace themselves up 
to meet, at night take proportions before which the bravest 
sometimes shrink. By morning, the terror heightened by 
this general weeping had the complete mastery over the 
multitudes. When Moses and Aaron attempted to with- 
stand it, they were met by a universal cry, " Would God 
that we had died in the land of Egypt V " Would God that 
we had died in this wilderness !'^ — for a quiet death in the 
wilderness seemed to them less terrific than by violence from 
these giants. 

The feeling in the camp was beginning to be dangerous 
to the two leaders themselves. As they stood there, firmly 
opposing the general alarm, they saw people's eyes either 
turned from them as unwilling to meet theirs, or flashing 
back an angry or a defiant expression. Looks were scowl- 
ing, and soon became fierce, and then were knit into expres- 
sions of set purposes of resistance. 

There w^as clearly a mutiny ! and finally it spoke out, 
boldly in determined words. There had always been bad 
men in the camp, jealous of Moses, envious, plotting, and 
mischievous, whenever there was opportunity for mischief. 
There always will be such in society, and they are as cun- 
ning as mischievous. Among the Israelites, such men had 
been ever busy with insinuations and evil designs ; but they 
had been kept down hitherto by the general sentiment in 
favor of the leaders. The poison from their words had, 
however, worked in men's hearts ; and now, aided by new 
efforts from the malcontents, it showed its effects openly. 
The whole camp broke out in one mutinous cry, " Where- 
fore hath the Lord brought us unto this land, to fall by the 
sword, that our wives and our children should be a prey ? 



412 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT, 

Were it not better for us to return into Egypt ? And they 
said one to another^ Let us make a captain, and let us return 
into Egypt.'^ 

Moses and Aaron felt that there was, indeed, no help 
now, but from on high. They fell on their faces before 
God, in the sight of the people ; a mute appeal to heaven 
and a sign of shame that those men could utter such words. 

Joshua and Caleb rent their clothes in grief and anger. 
They tried a remonstrance : " The land which we passed 
through to search it, is an exceeding good land. If the Lord 
delight in us, then he will bring us into this land, and give 
it us ; a land which floweth with milk and honey. Only 
rebel not ye against the Lord, neither fear ye the people of 
the land ; for they are bread for us : their defence is departed 
from them, and the Lord is with us : fear them not.^^ 

Alas ! the faith of the Israelites that God was with them 
had been dimmed ! They had so often shown themselves 
perverse and distrustful, that perversity and distrust had 
grown almost into an irksomeness of God's presence. They 
were in a turmoil of passions now, — of fear, of regrets, of 
longing for Egypt, of resentment against INIoses and Aaron, 
of doubts about God himself. Any appeal to their faith 
was only adding fresh irritations: even reason employed in 
argument stung them only into more furious rage. In the 
same degree with which they had previously respected 
Joshua and Calel) as brave men, they hated them now as 
the abettors of Moses and Aaron: passion and fury ruled 
in the demonstrative multitude : a universal shout arose to 
stone Joshua and Caleb ! 

But suddenly a deep silence fell upon all the multitudes. 
They were arrested midway in their murderous attempt: 
faces changcnl in an instant from the fierceness of anger into 
an expression of awe; hands raised, or clenching deadly 
missiles, fell as if palsied and incapable ; cold fear and a 
horror took the place of the burning rage just now firing 



A MUTIN7^ AND CARNAGE. 413 

the hosts. All eyes had been drawn suddenly to manifesta- 
tions of the peculiar presence of God in the Tabernacle, 
which his glory was now filling, and from which it was 
beaming forth. God was there strikingly and emphatically 
manifesting himself. The people were caught in the very 
act of mutinous and insane deeds of deadly intent, and they 
felt like detected culprits, which they knew themselves 
actually to be. 

Moses hastened to the Tabernacle; and he there had a 
revelation that filled his great heart with dismay. God 
said, ^^ How long will this people provoke me? and how 
long will it be ere they believe me, for all the signs which I 
have showed them? I will smite them with the pestilence 
and disinherit them, and will make of thee a greater nation 
and mightier than they.^^ Moses answered, " Then the 
Egyptians shall hear it;'^ and he added that all adjoining 
nations would rejoice at the destruction of God's favored 
people, and at the apparent inability of God to protect and 
help them. He ended with the prayer, " Pardon, I beseech 
thee, the iniquity of this people according to the greatness 
of thy mercy, and as thou hast forgiven this people from 
Egypt even until now.'' 

The prayer was granted to a certain extent. It was, 
indeed, made too clearly evident, even to human perception, 
that these people were not of such character and disposition 
as to do credit to any divine cause with which they might 
be connected. So abject had they become in that slavery 
for which they were even now longing again on account of 
its few meagre sensual comforts, so dulled in intellect and so 
brutalized, that nothing short of a miracle upon the mind 
seemed capable of elevating them to the sphere which it 
was intended that they should occupy. They were turbu- 
lent, ill-tempered, seditious ; easily acted upon by trifling 
circumstances or by mischievous people ; and altogether 
wanting in steadiness of purpose or in firm principle of 



414 LIFE SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

action or in steady faith. God had tried to elevate them, 
but his strong efforts and the great providences necessary to 
this had only produced in them presumption, and sometimes 
insolence; and now they had broken into open mutiny. 
They were clearly not the people fit to go in and possess the 
Promised Land, even though the way to such possession 
should be made clear by divine interposition : nor would 
they honor God's cause after such possession. 

The divine declaration was now made to Moses in the 
Tabernacle, that a part of the burden of their prayer, 
namely, ''would God that we had died in tJiis wildeniess,^^ 
should, with the exception of Caleb and Joshua and all 
under twenty years of age, be granted ; and for the rest, it 
was emphatically declared, '' As ye have spoken in mine 
ears, so will I do to you : your carcases shall fall in this 
wilderness ; and all that were numbered of you, according 
to your whole number, from twenty years old and upward, 

which have murmured against me But your little 

ones, which ye said should be a prey, them will I bring in, 
and they shall know the land which ye have despised." 

The multitudes were standing without the Tabernacle in 
trepidation. They knew that they were guilty, and that 
they had been caught in the very act of rebellion against 
God. The glory in the Tabernacle was filling them with 
awe. They knew the power of Jehovah, for they had seen 
it against their enemies at the Red Sea : — was it now about 
to overwhelm themselves? They knew there could be no 
escape from it: they stood silently in fear or they slunk 
away to their tents, everywhere meeting, however, only 
looks of alarm and of self-condemnation. 

Moses came out, and the divine decision was promulgated. 
Part of it met with a speedy fulfilment; for the recreant 
ten out of the twelve sent to examine the land were seized 
immediately by disease in the form of plague, and perished, 
— the first of the immense multitude that were to die off 



A MUTINY AND CARNAGE, 41 5 

and find their graves in that wilderness. Mourning suc- 
ceeded now to rage. Throughout the camp there were 
outcries of bitter lamentation, the greater because they 
knew that the general doom had been merited. There was 
in the mourning no comfort, no self-sustaining feeling, but 
only an utter despondency in that consciousness that they 
were in the hands of a Power which they knew there was 
no resisting, and which had already made the demonstra- 
tion before their eyes of a doom which was to be so general, 
and which, now that it seemed to be inevitable, took new 
and frightful horrors in their eyes. 

Then there came a revulsion of feeling once more. They 
spent a second night of grief, now more bitter than the 
other, for it was mingled with desperation, and had no 
relief of angry passion. But as the brightness of morning 
came and strung their nerves to better tension, there came 
with it also hope. They would make amends ! They de- 
termined to show courage, though it might be the courage 
of despair. They would seize on the land and possess it: — 
perhaps God would be mollified, and would change his pur- 
pose. " We have sinned against the Lord,^^ they cried ; ^^ we 
will go up and fight, according to all that the Lord our God 
commanded us.^^ They took their arms, and rushed onward 
toward ^^the hill,^'^ — the adjoining steep ascent to the table 
land bordering on Canaan. It was a tumultuous throng, 
without array or discipline, only carried away by the im- 
pulse of despair. They thought it could be no worse to 
perish there by the sword than by slow and certain death in 
the wilderness. Here there might even be hope ; in the 
wilderness there was none. They turned their backs on 
the ark and the cloud, which were now disregarded and left 
behind. Moses hurried after them with an appeal, '^ Where- 
fore now do ye transgress the commandment of the Lord ? 



1 Deut. i. 41. 



4l6 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

But it shall not prosper. Go not up, for the Lord is not 
among you ; that ye be not smitten before your enemies. 
For the Amalekites and the Canaanites are there before you, 
and ye shall fall by the sword : because ye are turned away 
from the Lord, therefore the Lord will not be with you.^^ 

As they are rushing on in this wildness of frenzy, we 
will look at the region soon to be so marked with disaster. 
Back of the fountains of el-Weibeh the ground ascends by 
several steps or offsets among desert limestone hills, to a 
platform about five hundred feet above the Wady Arabah. 
Across this platform the road passes transversely for about 
six miles, when it comes to the solitary remains of a small 
fort, and a ravine, immediately beyond which is the pass 
es-Sufah, "The Rock,'^ which was doubtless *Hhe hilP^ to 
which the Israelite host were now hurrying. This pass is at 
a series of almost precipitous cliffs, and is thus described by 
Robinson in his journey from el-Weibeh to Beersheba: 
" The mountain before us forming the next step of the ascent 
presented a formidable barrier, a naked limestone ridge 
not less than one thousand feet in height and very steep. 
Three passes up this mountain were pointed out to us, viz. : 
that of cs-Sufah directly before us ; on our right, not far 
off, another, es-Sufey, and on the left at some distance, the 

third, called el- Yemen The mountain before us we 

could now see was composed of naked strata of limestone 
lying obliquely and very irregularly, sometimes, indeed, 
rising up in convex curves, as if forming an external cover- 
ing of an arch. . . . AVe kept on toward the middle pass, 
os-Sufah, which afforded also the shortest pass. The way 
up it loads, for a short time, gradually along the edge of 
the precipitous ravine on the right; and then comes all at 
once upon the naked surface of the rock, the strata of which 
lie here at an oblicpie angle as steep as a man can readily 
climb. The path, if so it can be called, continues for the 
rest of the ascent along this bare rock, in a very winding 



A MUTINY AND CARNAGE, 417 

course. In such places a path had been cut in the rock in 
former days, the slant of the rock being sometimes leveled 
and sometimes cut into steps. The appearance is that of a 
very ancient pass. The whole mountain side presents itself 
as a vast inclined plane of rock.^^^ 

Rev. Dr. Olin says, respecting this ascent at es-Sufah : 
<^ April 5. We began our journey to-day by an ascent of 
the very steep and difficult mountain. It cost us hard toil- 
ing for one hour and a half. This mountain is composed 
of limestone formed in regular strata, which at this point 
dip to the south. The slope is tolerably smooth, being 
formed of a layer of the rock, which appears, when seen at 
a distance, as even and regular as a roof of slate or shingles. 
It is, however so steep that it is barely possible for loaded 
camels to ascend. We went on foot up the ascent, and I do 
not remember to have taken a more fatiguing walk.'^ 

The encampment of the Israelites was probably in great 
part on the higher ground west of Kadesh-barnea, and 
stretched on westwardly till it reached within five or six 
miles of es-Sufah or " the hill :'^ and we can imagine the 
armed throng hurrying confusedly onward, — Moses trying 
to stop them by his anxious, earnest appeals ; the cloud not 
leading them now, but disregarded ; the ark left behind ; 
only one desperate feeling — a resolution to reverse if pos- 
sible the doom that had just come to them from the Sanc- 
tuary, or if they could not do this to perish in battle. We 
see them rushing forward ; and we gaze with horror and 
deepest grief; for we know that those heights above are 
covered by their enemies, well aware from their lofty position 
of the disordered, confused approach, and prepared for 
resistance. It must be indeed a most unequal fight ; for the 



1 Kobinson thinks that in consequence of the similarity of names we 
may here place Zephath (Judges i. 17), and that, in times still antecedent, 
Hormah was here (Num. xiv. 45 ; xxi. 3 ; Deut. i. 44). 



41 8 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT, 

people above have only to set the huge rocks plunging 
down the precipice in order to assure to themselves an easy 
victory. 

During those forty days or more of the encampment at 
this place, the Canaanites had not been unobservant of the 
immense hosts on their borders ; and while the spies were 
traversing the land, the spies of their enemies were also busy, 
and the aggressive purpose of the Israelites could be readily 
ascertained. In that region to the north and west were also 
the Amalekites, who in their nomadic habits, were sprinkled 
over a wide extent of country ; and who had now the 
remembrance of their former defeat at Eephidim to avenge. 
They were united to the people of Caanan in this defence, 
and not a better spot could any where be found for it than 
this pass at es-Sufah, " The rock'^ or '' The hill." 

The armed host of the Israelites, had no leader now, 
neither God nor man. Moses was left behind appealing to 
them in vain. On they came, fiercely and confusedly : they 
could not trust God now, for he had forbidden them : they 
were desperate : they had immense numbers of fighting men, 
and they might perhaps hope to succeed by a fierce, sudden 
onset, and by the mere weight of numbers. The threatened 
doom of extinction in the wilderness was stinging them to 
madness : better to perish here, in their fulness of strength, 
they thought, than to drop one by one into graves already 
dishonored by that doom. — Perhaps hatred of God and 
fierceness against him stimulated some among those madly- 
rushing hosts. 

The result might be easily foreseen. The men above were 
fighting for their homes ; some of them urged on also by a 
desire for revenge. Those below felt that God was not with 
them, but against them. It was only a tumultuous onset, 
where as they might toil up the rocky precipices their 
weight of numbers could give them no aid, but would only 
make the greatness of the carnage more horrible. Rocks 



THE DOOMED HOST, 419 

hurled down would make bloody lanes of mangled carcases 
in the entire descent. If any, by desperate effort, could 
reach the summit of the one thousand feet, it was only, while 
spent with the effort, to meet there hosts fresh for the com- 
bat. It was an unresisted carnage rather than a fight. 
After vain efforts where desperation itself could do nothing, 
the Israelites turned to flee. They were pursued '^ to Hor- 
mah,'^ which we may consider to have been the town below. 
A rout, a w^ild panic and an unresisted slaughter made up 
the scene. The enemy " chased them,^^ says the Scripture, 
" as bees do /^^ but seem to have thought it best not to pur- 
sue them much beyond Hormah, but to keep by their 
strong mountain pass. 



CHAPTER XLIV. 
THE DOOMED HOST 

WHAT a sad history has been this of the Israelites since 
leaving Egypt ! and now to most of them it was to 
have a still sadder end. Yet how bright and joyous might 
it all have been ! For no people were ever so favored, so 
protected, and so kindly cared for, and so blest as they. 
Reading that history, we are filled with wonder at them, we 
grieve for them, we are puzzled at their obstinacy and per- 
verseness. Yet does not all that history of them and of 
God's dealing with them, as exhibited in the divine record, 
God in history, have a striking parallel in our own inner-life 
history; — God there with us, we with him? What a bright, 
joyous history that of every man's inner life, his soul-life, 
might be : but what is it ! 



* Deut. i. 44. 



4-^0 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

Amid such mourning as only the heart utterly overwhelmed 
can have, the Israelites took their way back from Kadesh, 
probably by the same Wady Jerafeh by which they had 
descended from the wilderness of Paran ; and now ascending 
once more to that wilderness, they began those wanderings 
which were to continue till nearly half of them would be 
laid in their graves. Very sadly indeed they went ; in 
addition to the weight of their felt doom, the hearts of many 
of them were with the corpses now turning into corruption 
at the place of that fearful carnage. They felt that God's 
favor had left them, and that they were travelling about 
under the gloom of his displeasure. Confidence had given 
way before the mortification of this terrible defeat : instead 
of their pride in Jehovah's peculiar presence and favor were 
substituted shame and dejection and grief 

It would have been well for them if this tumult of feel- 
ing had resulted in true humiliation of soul, and in a meek 
asking of God for the return of his favor ; but the end was 
of a contrary kind. They had begun to doubt, and to act 
on doubts ; and these now grew and took possession of 
them ; while spleen and jealousy and liatred came also, 
and had the rule. As the multitude now reduced but still 
immense, travelled along, their vexations, instead of causing 
them to look inwardly and reform, began to point to out- 
ward causes, and to lay the blame on others, — of course on 
Moses and his chief coadjutor, Aaron. The situation of 
these two men was indeed the most difficult of all possible 
positions for men to hold. Moses was tlieir leader and law- 
giver, yet he had no army to sustain liim ; had not even that 
power which comes through appointment by the popular 
voice ; had no authority except that which came from his 
own greatness of soul, and from the clear and repeated inter- 
ventions of Jehovah through him. But greatness of soul, 
amid popular commotions, often makes a man only the more 
conspicuous mark for envy and malignity, and these Israel- 



THE DOOMED HOST. 42 1 

ites now felt that they were turning away from God, and 
God from them. In their perverseness they argued, What 
had the leadership of Moses, and what had God^s favor 
done for them ? and their thoughts went to the rotting, un- 
buried corpses of beloved friends on that hill-side, and to a 
comparison of this wandering in the wilderness with their 
stationary homes on the green plains of Egypt. 

Then ambition came in with its own secret, subtle work, 
in order to complete the mischief. Aspiring men were 
plentiful in such a community ; and these first whispered in 
secret, and then they openly said, that Moses and Aaron 
were assuming more than they were entitled to ; were setting 
themselves too high above others, and ruling too much to 
the exclusion of others, and finally that all the misfortunes 
and sufferings had come from their maladministration. It 
was easy, in such a community, to insinuate such things, 
and to invent any malicious charges, and to give a false 
coloring to facts, — where it was all done without an oppor- 
tunity allowed to explain or to counteract. 

All at once mischief broke out into open form : and most 
formidable indeed it appeared. For the charge was a 
double one, and it was supported by a cousin of Moses, a 
Levitical attendant on the Sanctuary, and by two hundred 
and fifty ^' princes of the assembly, famous in the congre- 
gation, men of renown. ^^ 

To explain it, we must observe, that originally, priest- 
hood was not confined to any family, but that the head of a 
family, as Noah, Abraham, Abimelech, Laban, etc., was its 
priest. In the laws promulgated at Sinai, while the tribe 
of Levi were all selected for the purposes of the Sanctuary, 
and were called holy, yet out of the descendants of the 
three sons of Levi, namely, Gershom, Kohath and Merari, 
the family of Kohath was particularly chosen : and from this 
family, by a yet more particular selection, the house of Aaron 
was taken for the priesthood. Aaron was to be the High Priest. 

36 



422 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT, 

The present rebellion was headed by Korah, of the family 
of Kohath, a Levite^ but not a priest, though of the family 
from which the priestly house of Aaron had been selected — 
a man whose near relationship to Moses gave him promi- 
nence. Korah was assisted in this case by Dathan and Abi- 
ram and On, descendants from Reuben. The last, however, 
appears soon to have withdrawn from the cabal. The others, 
Korah, Dathan and Abiram, followed by the two hundred 
and fifty princes, came forward in a parade of their num- 
bers and position, — for it was now to be an open and a 
public rebellion, and all the people were, if possible, 
to be publicly committed, and were looking on. They 
came with a cry flattering to the community whose senti- 
ments they wished to enlist in the insolence of their address 
made to Moses and Aaron : ^^ Ye take too much upon you, 
seeing all the congregation are holy, every one of them, and 
the Lord is among them : wherefore then lift ye up your- 
selves above the congregation of the Lord ?'^ 

Only one answer could be given by Moses, — that of an 
humble appeal to God : — he fell on his face in this sorrow- 
ful and silent appeal. Then he rose and stood before them, 
very sorrowful yet, but now strong in heart. 

" Even to-morrow/^ he said, '^ the Lord will show who 
are his, and who is holy; and will cause him to come near 
unto him ; even him whom he hath chosen will he cause to 
come near unto him." And he then directed them to come 
on the morrow — for he wished to give them a day for 
reflection, — each one with a censer in his hand and incense 
and fire in the censer. It was allowable, by the law, only 
to the priests to offer incense : they were to present them- 
selves thus, in the eyes of the congregation, before God, 
and to see whether he would accept them as holy men and 
priests. He called Korah from amidst his supporters, and 
addressed to him a few words of reproval ; and then he 
summoned also Dathan and Abiram, but those would not 



THE DOOMED HOST. 423 

come. Their reply from among their company — loud so 
that all might hear — was, " We will not come up : is it a 
small thing that thou hast brought us up out of a land that 
floweth with milk and honey, to kill us in the wilderness, 
except thou make thyself altogether a prince over us? 
Moreover, thou hast not brought us into a land that floweth 
with milk and honey, or given us inheritance of fields and 
vineyards : wilt thou put out the eyes of these men ? we 
will not come up/^ 

The morrow was to decide. What thoughts passed 
through the minds of these two hundred and fifty men, and 
their principals, it is impossible to say; for they did not 
shrink from the trial when it came, and they may have 
become so perverted in judgment by listening to insinua- 
tions and by letting their minds take false views of things, 
as to no longer discriminate between right and wrong. But 
the case was a most serious one ; for the crisis for the whole 
congregation had come. If these men should prevail, — 
indeed, if a most decisive and impressive public reproof 
were not given to such sentiments and such cabals, — the 
unity of the people would be destroyed ; rulers in abun- 
dance would spring up and strive for mastery, and inevitable 
ruin to all would come. 

The night was one of universal and great agitations ; and 
at length the morning came. The two hundred and fifty 
princes with their three principals, presented themselves with 
their censers ; fear and distrust in the minds of some, in 
some boldness ; all spurred on by pride to meet the public 
challenge, and to brave the result. They were brought 
into the enclosed court surrounding the Tabernacle; and 
now in this latter " the glory of the Lord appeared unto 
all the congregation.^^ The Divine communication directed 
Moses and Aaron to separate themselves from the rest, 
^^ that I may consume them in a moment :" but they fell on 
their faces in an appeal, " O God, the God of the spirits of 



424 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

all flesh, shall one man sin, and wilt thou be wroth with all 
the congregation ?'^ They were directed consequently to get 
the people outside away from the neighborhood of the homes 
of the three chief conspirators, who seem by their common 
bond of union to have pitched their tents together, and to 
have made there also a false tabernacle for Korah^s use. 
And now, a chill feeling of fear began to spread through all 
the congregation, — a sentiment of awe from the glory in the 
Tabernacle, — a dread of some coming retribution, of which 
this separation was the forerunner, — a horror of exj^ectation ; 
— this general sentiment probably, in spite of themselves, 
aiFecting in some degree the three conspirators, who, with 
their wives and children, stood in the doors of their tents. 
Alas ! in how many instances, even in ordinary times before 
our own observation, have the wives and children, in God's 
providences, to suffer with the husband and father, the inno- 
cent with the guilty ? Moses said, " Hereby, ye shall know 
that the Lord hath sent me to do all these works ; for I 
have not done them of mine own mind. If these men die 
the common death of all men, or if they be visited after the 
visitation of all men, then the Lord hath not sent me. But 
if the Lord make a new thing, and the earth open her 
mouth and swallow them up, with all that appertain unto 
them, and they go down quick into the pit ; then ye shall 
understand that these men have provoked the Lord.'' There 
was a parting of the ground, as sometimes in the shaking 
of an earthquake ; the earth opened, and the tents and all 
in them were swallowed up ; " and they perished from 
among the congregation." The horrified people fled from 
the vicinity ; but a fire from God was swifter, and seizing 
on the two hundred and fifty guilty princes of the congre- 
gation consumed them. Elcazer was directed to gather up 
the censers which they had been using, and make with them 
a covering for the altar. 

But ^ even after this awful visitation, the evil of these 



THE DOOMED HOST, 425 

mischievous men still lurked in the congregation. Such 
sentiments as they had been inculcating are not eradicated 
by one exhibition of retributive power, but keep their hold 
still and rankle; and, indeed, will sometimes only take 
growth by the stirring up they receive from punishment. 
The feeling of the people so corrupted w^as now rather for 
vengeance on Moses and Aaron than one of conviction and 
humility. " Ye have killed the people of the Lord," they 
cried on the morrow, when their first sentiment of horror was 
succeeded by a mourning for the dead. ^^Ye have killed 
the people of the Lord," was repeated on every side ; and 
the cry was raised in the face of Moses and Aaron, till 
anger among the multitudes and a thirst for vengeance was 
beginning to drown all other sentiment. This evil, so rife 
and general, threatened to be worse than the former one. 

The " glory of the Lord " again filled the Tabernacle ; 
and the two men were directed, '' Get ye up from among 
this congregation, that I may consume them as in a moment:" 
but they fell on their faces in entreaty and in appeal for 
mercy to the offenders. A plague had, however, already 
broken out among the multitudes and was spreading fast. 
Moses directed his brother to take a censer and fire from the 
altar and to run in among the people ; and, on the edge of 
the spreading infection, to "make an atonement for the 
people." " He stood between the dead and the living ;" 
and as he did so, the plague was stayed. In this short 
period, however, fourteen thousand seven hundred persons 
had perished under this divine visitation. 

God sometimes writes before the world the record of his 
retributive power in characters of fire. That record in the 
Bible is for men to read ; and by it we can now look broadly 
over history and into the minute events of nations, and in 
them may see his hand. And yet, through all, he is a God 
of love. We know it ; for the love that brought Christ to 
earth to seek and to save that which was lost, and led him 

36* 



426 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

to die for us, was no new feeling in heaven. But justice 
and law over the universe also have their place ; and most 
sadly in this Jewish history we are called to contemplate 
continuously-repeated offences, and consequently continu- 
ously-repeated sufferings. But had those people cherished 
love and lived in love to God, how different the record 
would have been ! Surely God had deserved such love 
from them. 

One other remark we make here, and it is to be in connec- 
tion with an event which followed closely on the one just re- 
corded. In this divine record, there are events which some- 
times appear small in our eyes when we consider them as 
exercised by a Being so great and supreme as is God. But 
in effecting good purposes nothing is small, and so with the 
means which are used for such purposes : if it be a warning, 
or a remembrancer, or a plain, simple act, or even the sug- 
gestion of a common thought, nothing is small which can 
produce good. All good is great, all that promotes good is 
great : and without such result there is no greatness at all. 

The event now referred to, as seemingly a small matter 
for the interference of miraculous power, is the budding of 
Aaron's rod. There was to be a permanent proof of Aaron's 
right to the High Priesthood, to be preserved in the ark. 
Each of the tribes was to prepare a rod, and write on it the 
name of the tribe. Aaron's was to be on that of the tribe 
of Ijcvi. They were to be laid together in the Tabernacle, 
and the blossoming of any one rod was to be a sign of the 
divine choice for the priesthood. It was done : and, on the 
morrow, " behold, the rod of Aaron for tlie house of Levi 
was budded, and brought forth buds, and bloomed blossoms, 
and yielded almonds." 

The late dreadful visitations, and now after them this 
proof, seem to have been sufKcient to quiet the people, for 
we have no further record of rebellions : indeed, a feeling 
of tenderness, with dread, api)ears to have supervened in 



THE DOOMED HOST, 427 

their hearts. When Aaron^s rod was exhibited to them, 
they said, simply, " Behold, we die, we perish, we all perish. 
Whosoever cometh anything near unto the Tabernacle of 
the Lord shall die : shall be consumed with dying !'^ 

Consumed with dying ! indeed, so it was to be, not imme- 
diately, as they intimated it might be at the Tabernacle, 
but in that wilderness, on which they had entered, and on 
which they were now encamped. There the congregation 
remained for nearly thirty-eight years,' wandering about, 
encamping for as long a time as was most expedient; and 
changing gradually, from the rude, ungovernable multitude 
that had come out of Egypt, into a more enlightened and 
more tractable and better organized race of people. The 
former could not have conquered Canaan ; and even if led 
into full possession without difficulty, would have become 
speedily disintegrated into minute parts that would have 
made them an easy prey to their enemies. They were not 
worthy of such a possession : of the better qualities of the 
new generation we may see proofs in the future history of 
this people. 

Through these thirty-eight years the manna still came at 
night, quietly as the dew, and in the morning they found 
the necessary food lying by their doors. Respecting the 
supply of water on that wide desert, many surmises have 
been formed. Some idea respecting a supply, not only of 
water, but also of food for their flocks, may be, however, 
suggested, perhaps without any great danger of mistake. 
The writer of the present book has been twice at Payta in 
Peru, and in both visits ascended to the wide table-land 
above the city, stretching from it for many miles back to- 
ward the Cordilleras. The ground is level and perfectly 
bare, and not a green thing is to be seen on it ; the surface is a 
gravelly indurated earth, covered with small, black, rounded 



^ Compare Xura. xxxiii. 38 and Deut. i. 3, with Num. i. 1. 



428 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT, 

pebbles, and the whole stretch of country corresponds as ex- 
actly as possible with what the wilderness at et-Tih(Shiir)and 
at Paran in their worst condition are described to be. Not only 
did it seem to the author as if no vegetation had ever been 
there, but as if, supposing there had once been, every root 
and seed must have utterly perished in this baked ground, 
not visited by any moisture except perhaps a light rain once 
in five or six years. Yet the inhabitants of Payta said 
that after a rain the whole surface is in a few days covered 
with grass. Now, Robinson, when quite out on this great 
desert, stretching from Wady Arabah to the Mediterranean, 
one-third of the way from the former, makes this record : 
^^ In some spots we found very small tufts of grass springing 
up among the pebbles, the effect of recent rains. Our 
guides said that, in those years when there is plenty of rain, 
grass springs up in this way all over the desert. In such 
seasons, they said, the Arabs are kings.^^ He had just 
crossed a wady of which he says, " It is full of shrubs," 
and he saw a number of similar wadys on this plateau of 
the desert. We have already quoted his remark about 
Wady Jerafeh, that it exhibits traces of a large volume of 
water. in the rainy season : and is full of herbs and shrubs, 
with many Seyal and Turfe trees." His journey, notwith- 
standing the rain-fall just noticed, was in a year when the 
whole country from Sinai to Beersheba was subjected to 
drought in a very unusual degree. It is impossible to form 
an exact judgment of that region in the ancient times from 
what it is now; for the Arabs cut down tlie acacia trees to 
turn them into charcoal, and anything that could attract or 
retain moisture is ruthlessly destroyed. The distinguished 
traveller, Seetzen; in 1807, crossed et-Tih in a direct road 
from Hebron to Sinai, tliat is, across the centre of this desert; 
and when in the most desolate part, he asked his guide to 
mention all the neighboring places which he knew. The 
man named sixty-three in the neighborhood of Madurah, 



THE DOOMED HOST, 429 

Petra and Akabah, and twelve more in the Ghor es-Saphia. 
Of these seventy-five, all except twelve are now abandoned 
to the desert and have retained nothing but their names. 
The wadys all over this desert space are so broad and shal- 
low, that water flows slowly in them or scarcely flows at all, 
and in some of them, even in the dryest weather, it can be 
obtained by digging down only a few feet. 

We need only suppose, then, respecting the Israelites in 
their wanderings or temporary settlements, that with the 
manna there might be also a copious supply of moisture, 
and even in this region they would not only have water, 
but supplies of esculents from the earth for man and beast. 
We know that in all those countries vegetation of all kinds 
flourishes to a remarkable degree, even among the pure 
sands, whenever moisture can be supplied. It is true that 
such a supply of rain to the Israelites would be no less a 
miracle than if springs were to break out at every stopping- 
place: nor is it the object of these remarks to lessen the 
character of miraculous supplies to them : admitting the 
manna, we admit also the nature of any other supply of 
their wants. 

We have in the Bible no record of these thirty-eight 
years, doubtless because there was nothing in them instruct- 
ive for the future, as respects our duty toward God or man. 
The record is silent, but we know that one by one the adult 
population of these two and a half millions of people 
dropped away, and that in this desert were their graves. A 
million or more were buried there, and its wide, dreary, 
gloomy wastes may be called the fitting memento of such 
men. Death crept through the crowds of the doomed host ; 
and one after another fell with the mark of God upon him 
for the bitter sin of the people. 

At last all were gone ; and the camp might go forward 
again toward the Promised Land. 

When we next open the record made by their leader, it 



430 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

tells us of grievous siu by himself aud Aaron, by which 
they also were debarred from entering Canaan, though Moses 
would be allowed to see that country from afar. 



CHAPTER XLV. 
MOSES AND AARON DOOMED, 

IT is pleasant, after such a long period of obscurity hang- 
ing over the wanderings of the Israelites, to find them 
fully in our vision once more, and to be able to follow them 
clearly thenceforward in their progress toward the Promised 
Land. We gain our first knowledge of their actual position 
after thirty-eight years, from Num. xxxiii. 35, where they 
are stated to have formed an encampment at Ezion-gaber, 
which we know to have been at the northern end of the 
Gulf of Akabah. The town or rather castle of Akabah, 
which, with its surrounding grove of palms, breaks most 
agreeably on the sight of travellers through that region, in 
strong contrast with the bareness around, is supposed to mark 
nearly or quite the place of Elath (Deut. ii. 8) ; and Ezion- 
gaber we know to have been also at the head of that gulf, 
as it became, long subsequently to the time now spoken of, 
the port where Solomon fitted out his ships (1 Kings ix. 26). 
Of the latter city, there are at present no remains, unless 
some small hillocks as of rubbish near Akabah may indicate 
the spot, but its position as a port must be considered as 
well defined. Thence the multitudes travelled northward 
along the great valley of Arabah. 

During the whole of this present journey they had 
Edom immediately on their right ; and as they travelled on, 
their eye was regaled with the great variety, and oftentimes, 



MOSES AND AARON DOOMED. 43 1 

the very picturesque beauty, of objects constantly recurring 
on that side. Edom Is a mountainous district about one 
hundred miles long by twenty In width. As we pass along 
its edge in the valley of Arabah going northward from the 
gulf, we observe that It consists at first of porphyrltic rocks ; 
but to these very soon succeeds sandstone formation of a 
very singular kind. This latter, says Olin, "exhibits a 
beautiful variety of colors as well as of forms. There are 
some low hills rising between the base of the principal 
mountains and the plain which are a pure white, when not 
obscured by debris and sand. The main ridge is composed 
of yellow, red, white and sometimes purple strata. In one 
place an extensive perpendicular mass was of beautiful light 
slate color. Sometimes the summit to the depth of two or 
three hundred feet, is a delicate red, while the base is white 
and the intermediate strata alternately white and red. 
Again, the whole mountain is a deep red or brilliant white. 
Several masses are a delicate flesh color, a description chiefly 
applicable to the eastern range north of the point where the 
granite [porphyry] disappears. . . . The' action of the 
elements has given to many parts of this range something 
like architectural forms, where the eye Is often gratified with 
the sight of natural forms and colonnades. 

Among these singular masses and adjoining the edge of 
Wady Arabah, is the grand form of Mount Hor, which 
although making part of the range of Edom, is apparently 
so detached from everything else as to be a mountain by 
itself; and near the foot of It, toward the north-east are the 
remains of that strange city, Petra, lying in a bowl-shaped 
hollow, in the sides of w^hlch temples, dwellings, etc., have 
been cut into these rainbow-colored rocks. But Petra, 
though now ancient. Is of more recent date than the time 
of Moses. 

These strata bordering the valley rise to the height of 
about two thousand feet ; over them succeed limestone 



432 LIFE SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

ridges one thousand feet higher ; and finally these latter, at 
a distance of twenty miles from Wady Arabah, subside 
eastwardly into a vast table-land, which soon becomes a 
plain of pure sand stretching far off to the region of the 
Euphrates. 

But it was not only the variety of rainbow-tinted rock 
that made these mountains of Edom so attractive to the 
eye ; but the valleys cutting into them and often the sum- 
mits also were green with herbage and trees. " In the 
valleys/' says Robinson, in describing his visit, " were 
various trees and shrubs, the Seyal, Butm, and the like, 
also Retem in great quantities, — all very large. On the 
rocks above we found the juniper tree, Arabic Ar-ar (Lev. 
xlviii. 6) ; its berries have the appearance and taste of the 
common juniper, except that there is more of the aroma of 
the pine. These trees were ten or fifteen feet in height, and 
hung upon the rocks even to the summit of the cliffs and 
needles.'^ 

The mountain ranges on the west of this great valley of 
Arabah are much lower than those in Edom, and are in 
their full extent utterly bare and sterile; forming a striking 
contrast with those on the opposite side. 

Amid this scenery the Israelites moved northwardly from 
Ezion-gaber, glad to be once more advancing toward what 
they might now hope would soon be the conclusion of their 
journeyings. During thirty-eight years of wandering in 
the desert, they had in some degree accustomed them- 
selves to the nomadic life, in which energy stagnates, and 
all places affording supplies of food for man and beast are 
nearly alike. The doom during that time was upon them, 
and tlicy felt it. The fearful horrors of that scene of car- 
nage, where the bodies of so many thousands of their 
boldest men had been left to rot on the hill-side; and the 
opening of the earth afterward, in the rebellion, to engulf 
its leaders and two hundred and fifty of their })rinces; and 



MOSES AND AARON DOOMED. 433 

the scene of the plague, on the next day, and its fourteen 
thousand seven hundred victims ; — all this was branded on 
their memory, and had kept them in awe and in quiet 
obedience. Those of their warriors who had survived that 
carnage were now dead ; all others of the camp, who had 
brought inveterate habits from Egypt had died also ; a new 
race had come up, less debased, less stolid, less perverse and 
more readily subject to reason and authority. But still in 
the camp were many born in Egypt, who still remem- 
bered with longings its green plains, the vegetables and 
fruits and the delicious waters of the Nile ; and these 
presently became the source of mischief again revived in 
the camp. 

The advance along that deep Wady Arabah, shut in on 
either side by high mountains reflecting the hot sun, was a 
toilsome one. The whole valley is poorly supplied with 
water, the present scant springs at el-Weibeh (Kadesh-barnea) 
being the principal ones in a stretch of one hundred miles. 
The Israelites, on arriving at this place of their former 
encampment, came to it palpitating and parched with thirst ; 
and eagerly hurrying to the well-know^n spot of the fountain, 
they raised then a great cry of horror, for the fountains, 
probably owing to an unusual drought, were dry. As on 
former occasions, the cry was directed against Moses and 
Aaron : " Why have ye brought us out of Egypt, away from 
its figs and vines, and pomegranates and corn, into this evil 
place ? Why have ye brought up the congregation of the 
Lord into this wilderness, that we and our cattle should die 
there? Would God that we had died w^hen our brothers 
died before the Lord !" 

Moses was now one hundred and twenty years old, Aaron 
about one hundred and twenty -three. We can imagine them 
white-haired, their faces worn with care and with the heavy 
burdens imposed by this tumultuous host, which they had 
been compelled to bear for so long a time. Especially must 

37 



434 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

this have been the case with Moses, their leader, although we 
are informed that " his eye was not dim, nor his natural 
force abated/^^ Erect, strong, active, as was yet that form 
under the snowy crown of his old age, his long-continued 
vexations inflicted by such a rebellious and obstinate race 
had worn upon him ; and now when he saw the old spirit 
reviving and the old cry raised, it was a possible thing that 
his patience might utterly give way, and the fretfulness 
sometimes incident to old age might unconsciously betray 
itself. Alas for the Israelites if it should be so ! For he 
had often been the only interposing obstacle between them 
and merited punishment and had raised his pleadings with 
God for them, even when they were hurling their wrath 
against himself. Alas, if he should now by impatience or 
assumption draw upon Jwnself the Divine displeasure in a case 
where his very prominence would render it the more neces- 
sary that he should be made an example of God's retribu- 
tion, exercised for the sake of the general good ! Who 
would then stand between them and the divine punishment 
upon themselves ? 

Yet such a case, in regard to both Moses and Aaron, now 
occurred. 

In the midst of this outcry among the people for water, 
and their regrets about Egypt, and about their not having 
perished in the wilderness, these two leaders went to the 
door of the Tabernacle, and there fell on their faces ; and 
the glory of the Lord again filled the place, as it had often 
done. Moses was directed by the divine authority, " Take 
the rod and gather thou the assembly together, thou and 
Aaron thy brother, and speak ye unto the rock before their 
eyes ; and it shall give forth his water, and thou shalt bring 
forth to them water out of the rock : so thou shalt give the 
congregation and tlieir beasts drink." The assembly was 



Dent. 



MOSES AND AARON DOOMED. 435 

called, the rod taken, and Moses and Aaron stood before the 
rock ; and now, alas ! was a great offence committed on the 
part of these leaders themselves. They said, 

" Hear, now, ye rebels ; must we fetch water out of this 
rock?" 

Moses struck the rock and the waters gushed out, in 
quantities sufficient to afford a continuous supply to man 
and beast. 

But a great mischief had been done. Must WE ? The 
two men had put themselves forward in place of God. 
They had put themselves prominently as the workers of the 
miracle. They had not put God before the people, but 
themselves. The whole tone of their address was peevish, 
and showed an irritated state of feeling not suited to them, 
who should have been examples of forbearance and patience 
to the multitudes. But worst of all, they had arrogated to 
themselves the place of God. It was a terrible offence, 
coming from men in their position ; and we may believe that 
immediately afterward the awfulness of the sin flashed upon 
their convictions, and that they stood abashed and self-con- 
demned. It was a strange sight, — this man, hitherto so 
blameless and so great, yet now fallen ! Moses himself, 
weak and sinful, and Aaron, also a partaker in the sin ! 

Might it not be overlooked, for the sake of such long 
fidelity? No, it could not be. In addition to the fact 
that it was a sin, and no past fidelity could make it other- 
wise than sinful, was the other fact that they, and indeed 
the whole nation, especially at this time, were living for his- 
tory, as well as for the present. The history was to be 
a transparent one, through which all future time might 
draw intelligence and see God as the firm ruler over the 
world. 

So an example was made, even of Moses and Aaron, an 
example adapted to their high position before the people. 

"And the Lord spake unto Moses and Aaron, Because ye 



436 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

believed me not, to sanctify me in the eyes of the children 
of Israel, therefore ye shall not bring this congregation into the 
land which I have given themJ' They also were now doomed 
men, in a doom similar to that which had come upon most 
of their countrymen at this place and had scattered their 
graves so widely over the great wilderness. 

They bowed their necks in meekness, though in deepest 
grief; they saw the offence and the justice of the penalty; 
they went on in the performance of duty, but from this time 
forth with a great load upon their hearts. Their fealty to 
God, however, was not shaken. 

This journey to Kadesh, and the halt there seem to have 
once more alarmed the inhabitants of the country just to the 
northward, and to have brought on a desultory attack upon 
the Israelites, some of whom were taken prisoners. But 
there was no great battle ; for if Moses had again intended 
an invasion on this side, he was diverted from it by finding 
the people on the alert, and by remembrances of the former 
difficulties in the pass at es-Sufah. He therefore gave his 
attention at once to another route. 

Almost directly opposite to the spot where travellers agree 
in placing Kadesh, and only ten miles distant, is the largest 
of all the openings — Wady Ghuweir — ascending up into 
the mountains of Edom ;^ and if the Israelites could pass 
through this, and so around the Dead Sea on the eastward, 
they might then penetrate at once into the heart of the 
Promised Land. 

Burckhardt, who travelled in a south coui^sc through that 
region of Edom in 1812, thus speaks of Wady Ghuweir. 
" Proceeding a little further, we came to the high borders 
of the broad valley called El Ghoeyr (diminutive of el- 
Ghor).^ We skirted for about an hour the eastern borders 

^ The reader will do well to refer to the map on p. 310, No. 20. 
• The great valley of Arabah is called by the Arabs el-Gkor^ or the de- 
pression. 



MOSES AND AARON DOOMED, 437 

of Wady Ghoeyr, when we descended into the valley^ and 
reached its bottom at the end of three and a half hours, 
travelling at a slow pace/^ ... It is " a large, rocky and 
uneven basin, considerably lower than the eastern [high] 
plane, upward of twelve hours across, at its eastern extrem- 
ity, but narrowing toward the west. It is intersected by 
numerous wadys of winter torrents, and by three or four 
valleys, watered by rivulets, which unite below and flow 
into the ghor. The Ghoeyr is famous for its excellent pas- 
turages, produced by its numerous springs, and it has in 
consequence become the favorite place of encampment for all 
the Bedouins [of extensive districts north and south]. . . . 
The borders of the rivulets are overgrown with Defle, and 
the shrub Rhetem. The rock is principally calcareous. We 
ascended on foot through many wadys of winter torrents up 
the southern mountains of the Ghoeyr ; we passed several 
springs, and at the end of three hours^ walk arrived near 
the summit of the basin of the Ghoeyr.^^^ It will be re- 
membered by the reader, that Edom was the region to 
which Esau retired after the loss of his birth-right; his 
hunting excursions having made him familiar with this 
fertile country abounding in game : a tribe of followers had 
gathered around him, and with their aid he had driven out 
the former inhabitants, the Horites, and had here securely 
established himself. The present inhabitants, the Edomites, 
were descendants from him and his people ; and the Israelites 
were now directed to remember the old relationship, and 
not to molest these people, though it was desirable to pass 
through their land. 

The Wady Ghuweir, so famous even to this day, was 
doubtless the route referred to by Moses in a message which 
he sent now to the king of Edom : " Thus saith thy brother 
Israel, Thou knowest all the travail that hath befallen us, 



1 " Travels in Syria and the Holy Land." 
37* 



438 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

How our forefathers weut clown into Egypt, and we have 
dwelt in Egypt for a long time; and the Egyptians vexed 
us and our fathers : and when we cried unto the Lord he 
heard our voice, and sent an angel and hath brought us 
forth out of Egypt; and, behold, we are in Kadesh, a city 
in the uttermost of thy border: let us pass, I pray thee, 
through thy country : we will not pass through the fields, 
or through the vineyards, neither will we drink of the 
water of the wells : we will go by the king's highway, we 
will not turn to the right hand, nor to the left, until we 
have passed thy borders/' 

To this friendly and courteous message a curt refusal was 
returned : 

" Thou shalt not pass by me, lest I come out against thee 
with the sword/' 

Another message was sent to their king, and an appeal 
with it, and a promise as strong as could be made : 

" We will go by the highway : and if I and my cattle 
drink of thy water, then I will pay for it : I will only, with- 
out doing anything else, go through on my feet." 

" Thou shalt not go through," was the reply. More than 
this, vast armed hordes of the Edomites were now out 
guarding the difficult passes along the way. 

It was, indeed, a dilemma. The direct effort made on 
the left up toward Plebron had been most disastrous as 
already described ; the high road on their right was full 
of armed men, and the Israelites were forbidden to use vio- 
lence ; the Dead Sea shut up their way on the north ; — they 
turned of necessity and with much sadness down toward the 
south, along that wide, sterile, oven-like Wady Arabah, 
where, as they went, the hot sun was reflected from rocks 
on either side, as well as from the scorched sands at their 
feet. Their feelings were even more gloomy than any of the 
scenery around. 



\ 



AARON* S DEATH, 



439 



CHAPTER XL VI. 
AARON'S DEATH. 




The Summit of Mount Hor, seen from, the southeast. 

Mount Hor, twenty-five miles distant from Kadesh in a 
southeasterly direction^ is a very conspicuous object as seen 
from that place. The mountain range of Edom, to which 
this belongs, has been noticed in this work as rising from 
the eastern edge of Wady Arabah by successive offsets, 
which finally attain a great elevation ; but Mount Hor 
rises at once among the lower ranges, and thus stands 
prominently out, distinct and isolated ; its highest portions 
four thousand feet above Arabah and four thousand ei2:ht 
hundred above the level of the sea. 

It presents, at a distance, the appearance of a cone irreg- 
ularly truncated, having for the summits three ragged 



44^ LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

peaks, of which that on the north is the highest. On 
ascending it, however, one of these peaks is found to be 
rounded oflF; and between it and the adjoining peak is a 
small plain with a cypress tree, forming quite a contrast to 
the ruggedness and utter desolation immediately around. 
Bartlett describes even the rounded part as having a very 
narrow area, and says that, from it " the eye plunges down 
along a range of ribs of the mountain into a maze of 
fathomless defiles,^^ which wind about it and circle from the 
main range into the Wady Arabah. The view is very ex- 
tensive, taking in this wady, part of the Dead Sea, and an 
immense extent of the desert on the west, and is dreary in 
the extreme. 

On the summit of that mountain was to be the place of 
Aaron's death and burial. Overlooking as it does that 
vast, gloomy desert, the cemetery of the doomed portion of 
the hosts of Israel, it was a fitting spot for the grave of 
their first High Priest, also the last doomed. It yet re- 
mains in the same utter solitude, the striking graveyard- 
monument for them and for him. 

Miriam, the sister, had died and been buried at Kadesh, 
at an age, it is supposed, of about one hundred and thirty 
years. That place, called by Moses Meribah, " Contention,'^ 
was to him one of many bitter remembrances : and now, as 
with the multitudes he travelled southward from it, came a 
trial, the severest that, next to the loss of God's favor, could 
be inflicted on the aged man. He knew that Aaron, as 
well as himself, was not to enter the Promised Land ; but he 
might have hoped to have the companionship of this brother 
to the last ; to stand with him near the banks of the Jordan, 
and with him to gaze at the fair inheritance of their pos- 
terity. But it was not to be. He was here to part with 
this brother. As we grow old we cling with greater and 
greater fondness to the friends of our early days. But they 
drop from us one by one, and we are at hist left alone. So 



AARON'S DEATH, 441 

many have gone that the graveyard is not solitary to us, but 
the world is. 

Eighteen miles from Kadesh southwardly we come oppo- 
site to Mount Hor ; from this, an ascent of eight miles over 
the rugged acclivities conducts to the summit of the moun- 
tain. When the Israelites came in front of it Moses had the 
admonition that he was now to lose his brother. " Take 
Aaron^^ — thus was the divine communication — " and Elea- 
zar his son, and bring them up into Mount Hor ; and strip 
Aaron of his garments, and put them upon Eleazar his son ; 
and Aaron shall be gathered unto his people, and shall die 
there.^^ 

The two very aged men and the younger one climbed the 
mountain together. It has along its sides many steep acclivi- 
ties, and they toiled up them slowly, for there was no need 
for haste : — why should they hasten, the two attached brothers, 
who were so soon to have the last parting that men have on 
earth ? As they went upward, and stopped often to rest, and 
to hold communion so precious to them now, their eyes wan- 
dered over a wide space, — the vast desert to the west extend- 
ing till all was lost to their dimmed sight, the great sandy 
Arabah below them peopled over now with the multitudes 
of their countrymen, the mountain chains of Edom and the 
way leading to the Promised Land. Somewhere in all this 
wide scene was to be the course to Canaan, though where 
they could not tell ; for the cloud by day was still to be the 
unquestioned leader and the fire by night. They did not 
stop to conjecture, for they knew that God would lead 
aright ; but often, as they toiled up, or hand in hand they 
rested, their eyes sought each other^s face and dwelt on the 
features which had, for so many years and through so many 
trials, beamed each on the other with deep affection. And 
truly noble faces they must have been, even in this extreme 
old age ; for that exterior had habitually shown the expres- 
sion of great thoughts, vast and noble purposes, and loving 



442 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

affections. These two men had stood in the especial pre- 
sence of God, feeling him to be there ; and such a Presence 
produces expansion and grandeur of soul to the utmost 
limit of capacity in any earthly being. 

But there must now be a parting. After they had 
arrived at the summit, Aaron was divested of the garments 
of his office of High Priest, Eleazar was clothed in them, 
and by this act became his successor by the divine 
appointment. 

The congregation below, in whose sight they had gone 
up, saw, after a while, only Moses and Eleazar descend. 
Aaron had "died there in the top of the mount,^^ and 
doubtless had been buried by the hands of the brother and 
son.^ He died ; but how has his living soul spoken in that 
history through all subsequent time ! What a great life is 
a life which can leave behind such a testimony as his ! 

The congregation mourned for him thirty days. The 
mourning doubtless was sincere as well as general ; yet among 
the people were the alleviations from family affections and 
friendships and the communion in many pleasant associ- 
ations : what was their mourning compared with that of the 
solitary, desolate, bereaved old man ! He turned and clung 
now even closer than before to God, and he had comfort. 

Seventy miles south of Mount Hor is the head of the 
eastern gulf of the Red Sea ; and to this place the Israelites 
were now conducted along that hot valley of Arabah, the 
pillar of cloud still leading the way. They had begun to 



* The Molianiinedan possessors of this country consider Hor a sacred 
mountain and make pilgrimages to it. On the rounded summit, as pre- 
sented in this picture, is a small square building, such as they erect over 
the tombs of their saints. Beneath this is a subterranean chamber, 
whether artificial or a natural grotto it is not easy to say, as it is thickly 
coated with whitewiush, and visitors to the spot are watched with a jealousy 
which will not admit of close inspection. Burckhardt was not allowed to 
reach the summit, and Robinson and his party were equally unsuccessful. 



AARON'S DEATH, 443 

loathe the manna, though it was a healthy food and had 
at first been palatable. Its sameness, continued through so 
many years had become irksome, and the unceasing regularity 
with which it had been presented to them like that of the 
sunlight, had detracted from its miraculous character and 
made it seem as regular a part of the creation as the sun 
itself. To many of them, indeed, no other method of pro- 
curing bread had ever been known. Instead of gratitude 
to God for such a constant miracle in their favor, therefore 
was now supervened a feeling of dissatisfaction that there 
was not more variety, or that the supply was not of a dif- 
ferent kind. The feeling had been aided by a sight of the 
tantalizing green spots among the mountains of Edom in 
front of which their journey from Kadesh had been, but 
which they had not been allowed to reach. The cloud 
leading them had kept persistently toward the south, 
along the arid valley, where water was with difficulty 
obtained. Among those wadys far up at their left there 
seemed to be abundance and variety. Their impatience at 
last broke out once more into open complaints, and these 
were raised against Moses in the old manner : " Wherefore 
have ye brought us out of Egypt to die in the wilderness? 
for there is no bread, neither is there any water ; and our 
soul loatheth this light bread. ^^ Fed by God^s constant 
bounty, they loathed the food because it was not accommo- 
dated to their fanciful taste. 

The spot where they were at this time encamped is to 
this day remarkable for serpents ; and Bartlett on his way 
from el-Ain to it, speaks of the sands in the wady he was 
following, as ^^ curiously marked with numerous tracks of 
wild beasts and birds, and the sinuous trail of serpents:'^ 
Near the castle of Akabah is also a promontory known as 
Ras urn Haye, " Mother of Serpents,^' indicative of their 
abundance there. These were now multiplied so as to be a 
punishment. " Fiery serpents" they are called in Scripture^ 



444 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

perhaps on account of the heat and inflammation from their 
bite, though the Greek writers speak of a species of serpent 
with a '' burning breath/^ The Israelites were bitten and 
many of them were already dead, when the multitudes has- 
tened with cries and entreaties to Moses: "We have sinned, 
for we have spoken against the Lord and against thee : pray 
unto the Lord, that he take away the serpents from us." 
In reply to his supplications to God, he was directed to 
make a brazen serpent in imitation of these living ones, and 
to elevate it among the people. He had one cast, and on 
its being raised in their midst, all who looked upon it were 
saved from death. Long afterward, the Saviour of the 
world spoke of this act of healing as emblematical of what 
was to be effected by himself, " that whosoever believeth in 
him shall not perish, but have everlasting life." 



CHAPTER XLVn. 
TOWARD THE END. 



"VTEAR the place where they were encamped by Ezion- 
■^ gaber, there is a wady called Ithm,^ which winding by 
Jebel Ithm the most southern point of the mountain-stretch 
of Edom, ascends to the high plateau of the eastern desert. 
We have already noticed the region of Edom as about 
twenty-four miles in width, and as consisting of a succession 
of hills and then mountains, rising up from the Wady 
Arabah, till they reach a height of about three thousand 
feet, when they change into the lofty, sandy plateau which 
stretches off about three hundred miles in width to the plains 



' See Map on p. 310, No. 11. 



TOWARD THE END, 445 

of the Euphrates and the Persian Gulf. On this plateau 
the Israelites could advance northwardly without interfer- 
ing with the Edomites, whose feelings they were commanded 
to respect. The Edomites it was also said should be afraid 
of them ; and thus, in such a line of journeying, there 
would be forbearance on either side. 

The conducting cloud moved eastwardly from Ezion- 
gaber, doubtless up the Wady Ithm ; and the Israelites, 
after a two days^ journey, found themselves on this high 
plateau, and eastward of the possessions of the churlish king 
of Edom. It was to them a pleasant transition from that 
scorched valley of Arabah, and the scarcely less dreaded 
deserts on its west ; and they might also now look forward 
toward the end of their journeyings. So they travelled on, 
day after day, the Edomites keeping a close watch upon 
them but j&nding them to be harmless and even friendly ; 
and to the Israelites, any kind intercourse with another 
nation was indeed a novelty. The buoyancy of our nature 
returned to them ; they began also to have some confidence 
in their own martial strength, — which was indeed soon to 
be tried. Though the superhuman cause was unseen by 
them, the fact was clear to their eyes, that the Edomites, 
notwithstanding the former churlish defiance, were afraid 
of them, and were treating them with the respect which 
such dread produces. Thus, on this high plateau, where 
the air was pure and cool, and the breezes swept refresh- 
ingly about them, their feelings rose up into new strength and 
gladness, and they travelled on in the free joyousness of the 
nomadic life. But the aged patriarch himself, now op- 
pressed by the weight of so many years, and with a face on 
which long cares and vexations from them had ploughed 
deep marks, and with hair white as new snows on Lebanon, 
— on him this buoyancy and joyousness and social feeling 
fell as something apart from himself. He was old and soli- 
tary ; he felt that it was time for his own end to come, and 

3S 



446 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

he knew that it was not far oflF. There was one hope to 
cheer him : — he would then go home to God. 

For his people he still had many anxieties. He knew that 
there were nations before them different from the Edomites, 
and on whom, indeed, his nation would probably have to 
make war ; and the exhibitions of the military prowess of 
his own hosts back of Kadesh had not been such as to pro- 
duce confidence in them. He had confidence in God, but 
he was still bound to make use of the human means within 
his power ; and he must now be preparing the great force 
of his fighting men^ for any danger from hostilities that 
might be awaiting them. Before them were two nations 
barring all progress, and l)oth might be expected to be un- 
friendly ; for one of them had the established reputation of 
an aggressive, warlike people, and the other were a people 
descended from the old Rephaim race — the race of giants. 
Among these latter were walled cities of great strength, in 
which every house indeed might be considered as a castle. 

Moses had probably no full and clear knowledge of either 
of these nations, and yet some reports of their prowess, and 
of the danger in his front must have reached him and his 
people, as they were now journeying on toward the north. 
He knew that God was sufficient for all dangers, but it was A 
a very anxious question whether his people would be true 
to God? They had so often failed in their allegiance to 
Jehovah, and so often rebelled, that the leader had alto- 
gether lost confidence in them. Consequently, what results 
were before them now he could not tell. He only looked 
up and saw the leadership of the cloud, and knew that 
God's special presence was still with them. Over the wide 
plain were the multitudes rejoicing in their improved con- 
dition of purer and cooler air and wider freedom of mo- 
tion ; they were travelling on, most of them joyous, careless, 



1 601,730 in number. See Num. xxvi. 51. 



TOWARD THE END. 447 

thoughtless: he was thoughtful and anxious. The aged 
man felt now how great was the bereavement incurred in 
his brother^s death. 

Thus the hundred miles' extent of Edom was passed by, 
on its eastern side ;^ and then crossing the upper waters of 
the brook Zered/ now Wady Asha, they had on their left 
the country of the Moabites. These latter, together with 
the Ammonites, were descendants of Lot ; and the Israelites 
were also forbidden to do them injury, on account of con- 
sanguinity. This small region, only about thirty miles on 
each side, belonged to the Moabites ; but their relatives, the 
Ammonites, probably a nomadic race scattered about wher- 
ever they could find pasturage, appeared to consider it also 
as their home. Both are sometimes spoken of under the same 
name ; and both were now presently united in an intended 
mischief upon the Israelites. The Ammonites, when alone, 
showed themselves to be a set of fierce and bloody marau- 
ders.^ This region was also passed without any molestation 
given or received, the churlish inhabitants keeping aloof,"* 
though closely watching the Israelites. 

The small territory of Moab was bounded on the north 
by the river Arnon, now Modjeb, which, after passing for 
some distance along its eastern side, sweeps round to the 
west, and through a deep cleft enters the Dead Sea ; thus it 
made a strongly-marked dividing line between the Moab- 
ites, and their dangerous, aggressive neighbors, the Amor- 
ites on the north. The physical geography of the whole 



^ See Judges xi. 18. 

2 Deut. ii. 13 ; Num. xxi. 12. This brook now separates two districts, 
Kereky on the north, and Djebal on the south. The stream is now also 
called Kerahy, doubtless after its ancient name. Burckhardt says it runs 
in a deep and narrow bed of rocks, the banks overgrown with Defle trees. 
The country adjoining the place where he crossed it, was fertile, and 
abounding in fruits. 

^ 1 Sam. xi. 2 ; Amos ii. 1. 

* Deut. xxiii. 4. 



448 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT, 

of that country, and the names of cities or ruins still bear- 
ing the same names as in the days of Moses, seem to carry 
us back and place us among the very times of this journey 
of the Israelites. Burckhardt, in travelling through this 
region, was shown two miles north of the Arnon the ruins 
of Diban (Dibon, Num. xxi. 30 ; xxxii. 34) ; on the north- 
ern edge of the precipice leading down to the river, he saw 
Araayr (Aroer, Num. xxxii. 34), and he had passed, a little 
further north, the ruins of Hesban, the capital city, Hesh- 
bon, of the Amorites, where extensive remains of houses 
and deep wells cut in the rock, and a large reservoir, still 
bear witness to the former great importance of this place. 
Of the Arnon, he says, " The view which the Modjeb pre- 
sents is very striking ; from the bottom where the river runs 
through a narrow stripe of verdant level about forty yards 
across, the steep and barren banks arise to a great height, 
covered with immense blocks of stone which have rolled 
down from the upper strata, so that when viewed from 
above, the valley looks like a deep chasm formed by some 
tremendous convulsion of the earth, into which there seems 
no possibility of descending to the bottom ; the distance 
from the edge of one precipice to that of the opposite one is 
about two miles in a straight line. There are three fords 
across the Modjeb. I have never felt such suffocating heat 
as I experienced in this valley from the concentrated rays 
of the sun, and their reflection from the rocks. We were 
thirty-five minutes in reaching the bottom." 

Across this deep chasm the Moabites, on its southern and 
western sides, watched the great multitudes of the Israelites 
as they now passed along, and across it they afterward 
secretly stole in their efforts to do fatal mischief to these 
strangers, their relatives. 

The latter, passing by the Arnon, came immediately at the 
north of it in contact with the Amorites. Here they could 
no longer make a circuit around ; for their course to the 



TOWARD THE END, 449 

Promised Land lay directly through the territory of these 
people. They could have little hope of being allowed an 
easy transit through this region ; for the Amorites were 
themselves a nation of aggressors, accustomed to the use of 
armSj were a conquering people, and had lately come into 
the possession of this territory.^ They would consequently 
have the jealousy of new possessors, and would look with 
double suspicion upon the Israelites, whom they must con- 
sider to be a nation of invaders. The Amorites had orig- 
inally occupied the hilly country about Hebron, where they 
were among the earliest settlers :^ but increasing in numbers 
and attracted by the rich lands east of the Jordan, they 
had crossed that stream and made war upon the Moabites, 
whose territory at that time extended beyond the Arnon on 
the north, as far even as the Jabbok and the mountains of 
Gilead. These occupants were driven back behind- the 
narrow limits south of the Arnon, and the invaders under 
Sihon their king had full and quiet possession of the con- 
quered country. In this condition the Israelites found 
them. It was necessary to pass through their territory in 
order to reach the Jordan. Heshbon, their capital, was about 
twenty miles north of the Arnon and fifteen eastward from 
the Jordan, and was built on a hill commanding a view over 
this high table-land. 

The Israelites paused. In the migratory habits of 
nomads, their company is sometimes scattered for many 
miles over hill and plain, but their scouts always give quick 
warning of danger, and they are soon gathered into a small 
compass and prepared for a defence. There was no need of 
scouts here or of haste in putting themselves in a defensive 
attitude, for all had known that there was probably danger 
before them, and that blood might soon be shed. 

Moses sent a respectful and very peaceable message to 



1 See Num. xxi. 26-30. 2 q.^^^ ^ jg^ 

38- 



450 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

Sihon at his capital. " Let me pass through thy land : we 
Avill not turn into the fields, or into the vineyards; we will 
not drink of the waters of the well : but we will go along 
by the king's highway, until we will be past thy borders/' 
The answer was a stiff negative ; and this negative was sup- 
ported by a marshalling of all the forces of the Amorite 
king, men inured to battle and accustomed to victory. God 
came to the help of the Israelites. They were encamped 
just south of a small easterly branch of the Arnon, still 
beyond the Amorite territory ; but the injunction came to 
Moses, " Rise ye up, take your journey, and pass over the 
river Arnon : behold I have given into thy hand, Sihon the 
Amorite, king of Heshbon, and his land : begin to possess 
it, and contend with him in battle. This day ^\\\\ I begin 
to put the dread of thee and the fear of thee upon the 
nations that are under the whole heaven, who shall hear 
report of thee, and shall tremble, and be in anguish because 
of thee." 

A battle ensued, and the Israelites were victorious. They 
immediately followed up their victory with a conquest of all 
the land from the Arnon up northwardly to the mountains 
of Gilead and to the river Jabbok : in the heat of passion, 
as they spread over the country beating down all resistance, 
they were themselves carried into excesses, for neither age 
nor sex was spared. They ended with gaining full possession 
of the country of the Amorites. 



A VERT SINGULAR COUNTRY. 45^ 



CHAPTER XL VIII. 
A VERT SINGULAR COUNTRY, 

BUT before these armed hosts of Israel was now a 
country which might well bring them to a sudden 
stand, and to a questioning of their hearts respecting their 
faith in God as a helper. For clearly no other help could 
be of any avail to men so unprepared as they were in 
military appliances for the species of warfare now seemingly 
before them. 

Their conquest of the Amorites gave them possession of a 
region extending northwardly to the river Jabbok, which 
empties into the Jordan about midway between the Lake 
of Galilee and the Dead Sea. Beyond that was the kingdom 
of Bashan ; and we have the means, from recent examina- 
tions, of knowing what was the kingdom of Bashan in those 
times. Present observations seem to carry us personally 
back to just that period, and to place this country before us 
with its houses and cities and walled strongholds, exactly as 
they were then. As the buildings were in the days of 
Moses, just so we see them presented now; — the dwelling- 
houses standing as they were then, the cities as they were 
then, only now all are deserted, solitary and silent. 

No one can visit that country without being filled with 
astonishment at the perfect preservation of all the houses, 
and also at the utter solitude among them — great cities 
now just as they were three thousand years ago, except 
that they have not an inhabitant among them. It is more 
like a place of enchantment than a reality. Streets are 
perfect, houses are perfect ; they look as if they might have 
been great hives of human beings only yesterday, so com- 
plete is everything; but all living forms have vanished, 



45 2 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT 

leaving the structures alone to tell of generations buried 
long ago ; and these structures so solid that they look as if 
they might have been erected previous to the Flood. Indeed, 
we are there in contact with an antiquity oppressive by its 
vastness of extent, and by the questions which it starts 
without helping us to an answer. The traveller walks 
along the streets and into the houses or across the public 
squares, all so full of meaning respecting former active, busy 
scenes ; the echo of his foot-fall is all he hears, and he is 
startled by the sound : his own shadow affrights him in the 
utter solitude : he is alarmed, at last, at the universal death 
which has crept over the land, and which seems as if, by 
its absorbing power, it might seize also upon himself. 
There is a sense of relief when he gets away, and yet he is 
drawn back to it as by a kind of enchantment. 

There are a hundred Pompeiis here in a small compass 
of country ; not buried cities preserved because entombed, 
but cities for many ages open to the sun and rains, yet all 
still fresh and perfect, and with a country of richest soil 
around them : yet all is deserted ; all seems dead. 

The secret of this perfect preservation is in the material 
used in building and the mode of building, the former 
being indestructible, and the latter being such as to make a 
house, although a regularly built and convenient structure, 
be also like a hill of rock. The former is the black basalt 
of the country, as hard as iron, and even more durable ; it 
is the only substance used about the buildings, which are thus 
great masses of stone, — the roofs, the doors and gates all of 
stone. Only the bars inside of these latter have perished, 
but the morticed apertures for them are as fresh as if made 
but yesterday. The doors stand yet in their places, the 
floors and roofs are whole and sound ; and a stranger has 
only to go in and swing to the door, and he is in a rock- 
castle, safe from any outward assaults by man, secure also 
from the weather, and in a home all his own. There are 



A VERY SINGULAR COUNTRY. 453 

many thousands of such houses in cities and country ; all 
of them empty and deserted. 

One of these houses, a specimen of the ordinary kind, is 
described by Mr. Porter, a late traveller in that region. It 
was the first one he entered, and was in Burak, on the edge 
of this singular country. He describes it as having walls 
four feet in thickness, composed of large blocks of squared 
stones put together without cement ; the roof of regularly 
formed stones eighteen feet long, six inches in thickness and 
eighteen in breadth, their ends resting on other stones which 
projected about a foot beyond the walls on the inside, so as 
to form a cornice. The door of entrance was four and a 
half feet high, four feet wide and eighteen inches thick ; 
these doors are of stone, and made to move on pivots which 
are projecting parts of the door itself, and work in sockets 
in the lintels and thresholds, as do all the modern doors and 
gates in Syria. Sometimes the doors are as much as nine 
feet in height, and many of them are ornamented with 
figures of scrollwork cut in relief on their faces. In this 
house at Burak, the first apartment was twenty feet by 
twelve, and ten feet in height. From it, a low door opened 
into another room behind it, of the same dimensions and 
character ; and from this a larger door admitted to a third, 
to which was a descent by a flight of stone stairs. This last 
was a spacious hall equal in breadth to the other two, and 
about twenty-five feet long by twenty in height : the stone 
door so large that " a camel could go out and in with ease.^^ 
" Such," he says, " is a specimen of the houses in Burak, 
and such a fair specimen of all the houses throughout nearly 
the whole of the Haur^n. Some of them are larger, with 
spacious courts in the interior, into which the chambers 
open ; others again are small and plain ; but all are massive 
and extremely simple in their plan, thus denoting high an- 
tiquity." Some of the doors and gates are double ; inside 



454 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

of all are large sockets in the walls for the heavy bars by 
which they were secured. 

This large region of country, now called The Haurdn, — 
in the time of Moses, Bashan, lying between the Jabbok 
and Damascus on the north and south, and between the 
Sea of Galilee and the great desert on the east, has 
long been known to be one of very great interest, but also 
on account of the wild Arab tribes claiming it and at 
enmity with each other, so dangerous that few modern 
travellers have dared to attempt to enter it. Burckhardt ex- 
plored some portions of it in disguise : Buckingham saw a 
small part of it in 1816; Mr. Porter in 1855, under the 
protection of some powerful sheikhs, explored it more largely, 
but at last he and his party were set upon at the ancient 
capital Edhra, and barely escaped with their lives. A few 
years afterward Mr. Cyril Graham, well armed and strongly 
protected made a wider journey and came back unhurt, 
having penetrated defiantly even to the centre of the strong- 
hold of the country, the Lejah, the Argob of ancient times. 
The half-savage tribes of this desert scowled on him and 
flashed fury from their eyes, but hung back before his bold- 
ness and circumspection and the strength of his escort. 

All these travellers have been struck with the extreme 
antiquity evident in those stone houses, and attribute them 
to the very earliest times. The Romans, it is true, had pos- 
session of the country (for this was the region called Gau- 
lanitis, Auranitis, etc., of our Saviour's time); and those 
universal conquerors have left numerous proofs of their 
dominion, still to be seen in the columns and inscriptions 
in these cities ; but the stone houses referred to are of a 
different type of architecture, and evidently long anterior to 
that of the Romans, and with a simplicity and massiveness 
never seen in the structures of that comparatively modern 
people. All travellers give them an age of at least three 
thousand years. 



A VERT SINGULAR COUNTRY, 



455 



Therefore in speaking of these remains now evident to 
our eyes, in the Haurd>n, we can safely go beyond the Ro- 
mans, and can consider them as belonging to the Bible 



Map of a portion of the Hauran, anciently Bashan. 
{Compiled from Porter's and Graham's Maps.) 




•5 



10 



20 



n •7 

30 English miles. 



•6 



A. Part of the Lake of Galilee. 

1. Edhra, the Edrel of the time of Moses. 

2. Kuratha=Coreathe of those ancient times. 

3. Kunawat=Kenath. 

4. Buzrah=Bozrah. 

6. Kureiyah=Kerioth. 

6. Sulkhad=Salkah. 

7. Um-el-Gemal, probably Beth-gamul. 

8. Shuka=Saccaia. 

9. Bathanyeh=Batanea. 

10. Burak. 

11. Gadara. 

The river is the Hieromax. Fifty miles east of the Lejah is a similar spot called es-Safah^ 
examined by Graham. 



456 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT, 

account of the times of Moses, when Og, king of Bashan, 
had there " threescore cities'^ " fenced with high walls, gates 
and bars ; besides unwalled towns a great many." 

That scriptural account of possessions in those days, in a 
region so comparatively small, might in the minds of per- 
sons disposed to doubt, give rise to much skepticism ; for 
those times were so very remote, and walled cities were so 
rare, and this region was so incompetent apparently to sup- 
port such populations : but, strange as it may all seem, we 
have here the proof before us in that very strange land. Mr. 
Porter says, speaking of such startling accounts in the Bible 
history, " [In former times,] I had myself turned to my 
atlas where I found the w^hole of Bashan delineated and 
not larger than an ordinary English county. I was sur- 
prised, and though my faith in the Divine Record was not 
shaken, yet I thought some strange statistical mystery hung 
over the passage. That one city, nurtured by the commerce 
of a mighty empire, might grow till its people could be 
numbered by millions, I could well believe, — and that two 
or even three might spring up in favored spots, clustered 
together, I could also believe. But that sixty loalled cities^ 
besides unwalled towns a great many, should be found in 
such a remote age, far from the sea, with no rivers and little 
commerce, appeared quite inexplicable. Inexplicable and 
mysterious though it appeared, it was strictly true. On the 
spot, and with my own eyes, I had now verified it. Lists 
of more than one hundred named cities and villages in these 
mountains [Jebel Ilaurdn] alone I had tested and found 
correct, though not complete. More than thirty of these I 
had myself either visited or observed so as to fix their posi- 
tion on the map. Of the high antiquity of these ruins 
scarcely a doubt can be entertained, and the extent of the 
more important among them has already been estimated. 
Here, then, we have a remarkable record more than three 
thousand years old, containing incidental statements and 



A VERT SINGULAR COUNTRY. 457 

statistics which few would be induced to receive on trust and 
not a few to cast aside as glaring absurdities, and yet which 
close examination shows to be minutely correct J' ^ 

Among those visited by him were, 

Bathanyeh, the ancient Batanea. 

Sulkhad (Salchah, Josh. xiii. 11 ; Deut. iii. 10; Josh. xii. 
5), two to three miles in circumference. Here, ^^on the 
plain extending from the south to the east/' he says, ^' I 
counted fourteen towns or large villages, none of them more 
than twelve miles distant, and almost all of them, as far as 
I could see by the aid of the telescope, still habitable like 
Sulkhad, but completely deserted. '^ 

Kureiyeth (Kerioth, Jer. xlviii. 23, 24 ; Amos ii. 2), same 
size as Sulkhad. 

Busrah (Bozrah, Gen. xxxvi. 33 ; Isa. xxxiv. 6 ; Ixiii. 1 ; 
Jer. xlix. 13), one and a quarter by one mile in extent. 

Suweideh, four miles in circuit. 

Kunawat (Kenath, Num. xxxii. 42), one mile, by half a 
mile. 

Shubhka, two miles in circuit. 

Graham went further than Porter, and saw more, and yet 
he had to leave much of the country unexplored. Among 
the places visited by him was Um el Jemal, *' an enormous 
city," probably Beth-gamul of Scripture.^ ^^ This," he says, 
" is perhaps amongst the most perfect of the old cities that 
I saw. It is surrounded by a high wall, forming a rectan- 
gle, which seems to enclose as much space as the walls of the 
modern Jerusalem. . . . The houses are some of them very 
large, consisting usually of three rooms on the ground floor 
and two on the first story, the stairs being formed of large 
stones, built into the house walls, and leading up outside ; 
sometimes there were folding doors, and some of them were 
highly ornamented." ..." Taking my rifle with me, I 



^ " Five Years in Damascus." " Jer. Ixviii. 23. 

39 



458 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT, 

wandered about quite alone in the old streets of the town, 
entered one by one the old houses, went up stairs, looked 
into the rooms, and, in short, made a careful survey of the 
whole place ; but so perfect was every street, every house, 
every room, that I could almost have fancied, as I was 
wandering alone in this city of the dead — seeing all perfect, 
and yet not hearing a sound — that I had come upon one of 
those enchanted places that one reads of in the ^Arabian 
Nights,^ where the population of a whole city had been 
petrified for a century/^ He says again, 

" Og, we are told, was of the remnant of the Rephaim, 
and that he was indeed a giant the length of his bedstead 
shows. We are told his cities were cities of stone, with 
high walls, bars and gates ; these are the cities which the 
Israelites took from him ; these are the cities which, in later 
times, the Romans occupied and adorned, and these are the 
very cities which still are standing, and bearing testimony 
to the truth of God's word. 

'' Suppose, for a moment, that no one had ever yet trav- 
elled in the Haurdn, on reading the different passages in the 
Old Testament which refer to that country, should we not, 
when we read the account of such prodigious numbers of 
stone cities, have expected to find at least some remnant of 
them now ? And when we read in Deut. iii. of ^ threescore 
walled towns, and unwalled towns a great number,' and we 
see how small a space Og's kingdom occupies on the map, 
we might almost feel tempted, as many have been, to think 
that some mistake with regard to the numbers of these 
places had crept into the text. But when we go to the 
very country, and find one after another great stone cities, 
walled and unwalled, with stone gates, and so crowded 
together that it becomes a matter of wonder how all the 
people could have lived in so small a tract of country; 
when we see houses built of such huge and massive stones, 
that no force that could ever have been brought against 



A VERT SINGULAR COUNTRY. 459 

them in that country would have been sufficient to batter 
them down ; when we find rooms in these houses so large 
and so lofty that many of them would be considered fine 
rooms in a large house in Europe ; and lastly, when we find 
some of these towns bearing the very names that cities in 
that country bore before the Israelites came out of Egypt, I 
think we cannot help feeling the strongest conviction that 
we have before us the cities of the giant Eephaim, the cities 
of the land of Moab. These cities have become gradually 
deserted, as the Arabs of the desert have increased in num- 
ber, and now south and east of Sulkhad not one of these 
many towns is inhabited. ... 

^^ I am now more than ever convinced that among the 
evidences of the truth of Scripture, there are few stronger 
than those — undesigned — coincidences which arise out of 
the examination of the topography. Before the present cen- 
tury little was known of these countries ; but now, each few 
years, some researches bring' to light more and more facts 
connected with the early history of the places with which 
we are so much concerned in Holy Writ. And we may be 
quite sure that every certain extension of our knowledge in 
this respect will afford us additional conviction of the scru- 
pulous accuracy of the Holy Scriptures. At the same time, 
such knowledge is not to be attained without some difficulty 
and risk, but I think that one may well be justified in in- 
curring these, where there is hope of such important and 
valuable results being attained.^^^ 

But, if the whole country of the ancient Bashan was so 
remarkable, still more so was its central spot, the Argob of 
Scripture, where was the capital of Og, the king. This spot, 
called now the Lejah, is worthy of a particular description 
by itself. 



1 " Explorations in the Desert east of the Hauran and in the ancient 
land of Bashan, by Cyril C. Graham, Esq., F.E.G.S. &c.,'' (In Journal of 
the Koyal Geographical Society, vol. xxviii.). 



460 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

If the reader will suppose himself to have ascended the 
lofty eminences bordering the Lake of Galilee on the east, 
he will find that the ground soon forms itself into a plateau 
or level table-land, extending far before him and giving 
evidence of the greatest natural fertility. Crossing over 
this plain eastwardly, for about thirty-five miles, he will 
come suddenly to a region of some extent, looking as if the 
earth had opened itself and shot upward huge masses of 
black volcanic rocks, pitching them together in a very fantastic 
and irregular manner, mostly crowded, but sometimes with 
small spaces between. It may be called a volcanic island 
lifted up and left to rest on this great level, alluvial plain ; 
and no rocky shore of any island is better defined than is 
th-e boundary of this mass of black, hard and sharp rocks. 
This is the Lejah : it is an irregular oval in shape, and is 
about twenty-two miles from north to south, by fourteen in 
width, or about sixty-seven in circuit. Its general surface 
is from twenty to thirty feet above the plain, but this sur- 
face is covered all over with those jagged, crowded rocks 
having the appearance that would be presented, says 
Graham, *^ if a vast quantity of molten metal were confined 
in some vessel and its surface violently agitated by some 
powerful agent, and while in that state the mass were sud- 
denly cooled.^^ Burckhardt describes the rocks as sometimes 
twenty feet in height, and *^ cleft asunder so that the whole 
appear shivered and falling down." Porter remarks, " It 
is wholly composed of black, basalt rock. The cup-like 
cavities from which the liquid mass was projected are still 
seen. There are in many places, deep fissures and yawning 
gulfs with ragged, broken edges, while in other places are 
jagged heaps of rock that seem not to have been sufficiently 
heated to flow, but were forced upw^ard by the mighty 
agency and then rent and shattered to their centre. The 
rock is filled with little pits and protuberances like air- 
bubbles, is hard as flint and emits a sharp, metallic sound 



A VERT SINGULAR COUNTRY. 461 

when struck/^ Here and there occur small patches of grass, 
and there are a few trees ; but^ with such slight exceptions, 
it is only a labyrinth among molten rocks where a stranger 
is immediately lost, and in which only the Arabs have the 
clue. From a hill in the centre, three hundred feet in 
height, the eye wanders over this singular scene, and also 
discovers* several towns within the Lejah, the houses scarcely 
distinguishable from the masses of rock. Their inhabitants 
now, as in the time of Josephus (Antiq. xv. 10, § 1), are a 
savage set of robbers, at war with all the neighboring 
country. Burckhardt, disguised as a native, ventured into 
the Lejah ; Porter and his companion entered a city on its 
edge, and were near forfeiting their lives by the act ; 
Graham went in boldly with a large escort well armed, and 
met everywhere savage looks, but was left unhurt. 

On the west side of the Lejah, about halfway along its 
edge, is a projection about two miles long by a mile and a 
half in width, having the same character as all the rest, of 
jagged basaltic rocks and defiles ; and here at present is the 
city of Edhra, doubtless on the site of the former Edrei,^ 
the capital of Og, the king. Remains of the ancient city 
still cover a space there of a mile long by two-thirds of a 
mile in width. Porter and his party ascended to the city 
by a winding, rugged path on which the horses kept their 
footing with difficulty ; and from the terrace of the sheikhas 
house he had a view of the wilderness of rocks adjoining. 
As seen from this spot, the huge masses of masonry forming 
the houses could scarcely be distinguished from the rough 
basaltic masses by which they w^ere everywhere surrounded ; 
and he says that houses and rocks were black alike, as if 
scathed by lightning. 

We are now prepared to coincide with the words of the 



1 There is another claimant for this in Dera, ten miles southwest of this 
on the great plain, but the probabilities are altogether in favor of this one 
at the Lejah. 

39 * • 



4t>2 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

distinguished geographer, Carl Ritter, respecting the Hau- 
r^n, that, ^^ tliese buildings r^emain as eteimal witnesses of the 
conquest of Canaan by JeliovahP 

The Israelites after their conquest as far north as the Jab- 
bok, saw across that stream the edge of this very populous 
and powerful country. What could they effect against a peo- 
ple and against cities such as these; — they a pastoral race, 
scant in even the common appliances for war ? When at Ka- 
desh, thirty-eight years previously, their spies had brought 
them intelligence about walled cities and the giant race in 
Canaan, they had been thrown into such trepidation as led to 
a mutiny ; but here were before them sixty walled cities, 
which must now be taken, and the king of that country 
was remarkable for size even among the giant race. It is, 
true, that their recent victories over the Amorites were 
adapted to inspire them with courage, but we can imagine 
the chill of dread which pervaded the vast Israelite hosts 
when Moses marshalled his warriors for the crossing of the 
Jabbok. Even he could not be confident except only in 
God. The Deity, it was true, was able to give them 
strength to subdue this people ; but how often had the 
Israelites shrunk from God, how often rebelled against him, 
and how often, in return, had he left them to be a prey to 
their enemies ! A similar case respecting similar people had 
already occurred: could Moses trust his countrymen now? 
If they should fail in this present instance, what an utter 
horror of defeat and almost of extinction must be before 
them and him ! 

The aged man, with one hundred and twenty years upon 
him, and head white as snows of Hermon close adjoining, 
yet still vigorous, and looking in hope to God, conducted 
them across the stream and into Bashan. Their march lecl 
them very soon, close by the strong walls of that large city 
now called Urn el Jemal, still one of the most remarkable for 
its stone houses, and thence by Bozrah, and not far from 



A VERY SINGULAR COUNTRY 463 

Kerioth and Salchah, all of them large walled cities, while 
in every direction were evidences of a very dense popula- 
tion and of a flourishing country. They could see the in- 
habitants looking down upon them from the city walls, as 
they passed one strong place after another ; and they might 
easily perceive how utterly desperate was any effort by their 
own unassisted power against fortified places like these. 
Such a populous country, they also could readily conjecture, 
would be able to produce a large armed force which must 
be encountered somewhere ; for such a land as this would 
not be yielded unresistingly. With such thoughts as these 
the Israelite armed hosts followed their aged leader past the 
cities and towns of these rock-houses, onward toward the 
north ; and then at last they came in sight of that wonder- 
ful region, the Lejah — then called Argob, — bristling with 
its black pinnacled rocks rising above the island-like forma- 
tion which rested on the wide plain. 

On that plain was also soon before them an immense host 
prepared for battle; for Og and "all his people were there." 
Along on the edges of that black promontory running out 
from Argob, where the whole region as far as their sight 
could reach, was like a natural fortress, spears were seen 
glittering and from it defiant cries were heard, while below 
on the open ground, as if scorning to seek such help, and 
confident of success, the giant king had marshalled his many 
thousands for the fight. 

Og had judiciously chosen the borders of the Lejah for 
the place of combat. If he were defeated, that labyrinth of 
rocks, he believed, would be a place of safe retreat ; for one 
man, knowing its recesses is a match for a dozen in a place 
where a stranger, even if unimpeded, is soon confused and 
lost. So he had drawn up his army on the edge of his capital 
at Edrei, and there was awaiting the approach of Moses and 
his host. The latter host came on with strangely agitated 
feelings. Their leader probably was calm. His heart had 



464 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

reason to be quiet in its entire confidence ; for however un- 
worthy might be his own people^ and however weak he was 
himself, even now with his doom from such weakness rest- 
ing upon him, God had just spoken to him and said, respect- 
ing this heathen king, '' Fear him not : for I have delivered 
him into thy hand, and all his people and all his land, and 
thou shalt do to him as thou didst unto Sihon king of the 
Amorites, which dwelt at Heshbon/' 

In confidence from such a promise, the heart of Moses 
might well be calm ; and we may believe that the word of as- 
surance had been promulgated widely among his people. But 
still, as they saw this strange region and this immense armed 
force, and the form of the giant king towering far above all 
others, they came on with most agitating emotions, among 
which, in many hearts, fears doubtless had place. They 
could trust God's power, but they had learnt to distrust 
each himself and all others in respect to God. 

But the power of God was with them ; and against it all 
armed hosts and walled cities and natural or artificial de- 
fences are of no avail. The Israelites triumphed, and soon 
had possession of the whole country. God only could have 
given them the supremacy in a region like that. Og was 
slain in this battle at Edrei. He was the last of the giant 
race in that country : his bedstead (of iron) was sixteen and 
a half feet long by seven iiidi four inches in width.* 

It is singular that in this wonderful country, we have to 
this day, united with the proofs of the miraculous power 
exhibited in subduing it, also evidence cut on those same 
rocks of the cause of divine interference for the extinction 
of this people of Bashan. Og, we are informed, " dwelt at 
Ashtcroth in Edrei." ^ In the time of Abraham we read 
of Ashtcroth Karnaim,^ Ashteroth of horns, or horned Aside-- 
rothy as a city in this country of the Rephaim or giants. 
Mr. Porter discovered at Kunawat (Kenath, Num. xxxii. 

1 Deul. iii. 11. ' Deut. i. 4. * Gen. xiv. 5. 



A VERT SINGULAR COUNTRY. 



465 



42), ten miles from the southern end of the Lejah, a mu- 
tilated colossal head, three feet in width and standing out 
three feet from the block of stone on which it was cut. A 
copy of his drawing of it is here presented to the reader, 
and we can have little difficulty in recognizing, by means 
of the crescent and rays, the representation of the horned 
Ashteroth. 




Head in alto-relievo, believed to be of " Ashteroth Karnaim" (Gen. xiv. 5), recently 
discovered in the ancient Bashan. 

This goddess, as has already been remarked in this work, 
was the Astarte of the Syrians and the Venus of the Greek 
mythology ; and the most disgusting and demoralizing ob- 
scenities were practised in her temples as a part of her wor- 
ship. We shall have occasion soon to advert again to this 
subject in connection with Baal and the efforts made to cor- 
rupt the Israelites before crossing the Jordan. In addition 
to the hurtful influence which heathenism possesses in any 
form, there was in the worship of Baal and Ashteroth the 
additional wickedness of such gross obscenities, with an 
effort to excuse or gloss them over by subtleties of reasoning 



466 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT, 

about the principles of life. It was therefore the most dan- 
gerous of all the systeras of heathenism, because it had the 
strongest appeals, and most artful apologies in favor of the 
worst forms of human depravity. We have thus the reason 
for the divine decree of extinction, commenced here east of 
the Jordan, and to be executed still more widely in Canaan. 



CHAPTER XLIX. 
BALAAM. 



IT was with a feeling of intense satisfaction and of grati- 
tude to God that the venerable leader of the Israelites, 
after the battle of Edrei and the subsequent rapid occu- 
pancy of that country, returned now to the general encamp- 
ment from which he had set out on this expedition. To 
the whole of these great multitudes the late successes were 
also a subject of the warmest congratulations, for not only 
had they come into possession of rich territories, but they 
had also a most cheering warrant for the future. They 
were now on the immediate borders of Canaan, only the 
Jordan separating them from that promised land. They could 
look over a large extent of that country, and just below them, 
across that stream, was a great plain, so rich in verdure, and 
so marked with all the signs of plenty and beauty, that they 
were anxious to cross over and take immediate possession. 
Therefore, now that their arms had been so miraculously 
successful over the warlike Amorites, and the populous and 
strong region of Bashan, they were confident of easy con- 
quests on the other side of Jordan, and they were watching 
the cloudy pillar with eagerness, to see it move and lead 
them on. But as yet it gave no signs of moving; and 



i 



BALAAM, 467 

although a feverish excitement of expectancy prevailed, 
they had to be contented for a few more weeks in their pre- 
sent condition, their leader in the mean time arranging for 
the permanent occupancy of their new possessions. To his 
people it soon became a time of trial, and through their 
perversities of a fearful lapse from purity and fidelity to 
God, and of a frightful retribution. Strange that a nation, 
so favored, bound so closely to Jehovah by strongest ties, 
could be so quick to forsake him for Baal and Ashteroth ! 

The country of the conquered Amorites which they were 
now occupying, the reader will remember, was just north of 
the Arnon, and was bordered westwardly by the northern 
end of the Dead Sea and the lower course of the Jordan. It 
was a continuation of the high table-land which they had 
traversed east of Edom, and beyond it on the eastward still 
lay the great sandy desert stretching to the Euphrates. But 
the place of their present occupancy on this high plateau 
was fertile, and had a pleasant variety of grounds, with 
some prominences or hills rising above the other por- 
tions. At its western edge, the ground suddenly subsides 
toward the Dead Sea and the banks of the Jordan, leaving, 
however, by the latter, an interval or plain about three 
miles wide, and extending some distance northwardly along 
its banks. This was called the " Plain of Shittim,^^ from 
the numbers of Shittim or Acacia trees, which, fed by the 
streams from the higher lands, flourished here, and by their 
shade formed an agreeable retreat. A great many of the 
Israelites were encamped among these trees, while others 
occupied the plateau, which was three thousand feet above, 
and was fanned by breezes in a more healthy atmosphere. 

The surface of the Dead Sea as already noticed is thirteen 
hundred and twelve feet below the level of the Mediterra- 
nean : consequently the Jordan flows as in a deep chasm, and 
this Plain of Shittim on the banks, both from its great de- 
pression and the reflections of heat from the steep ascents 



468 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

adjoining has a genial temperature, even when the weather 
above is unpleasantly cool. But it is enervating, and the 
Israelites found it to be so. Directly opposite the plain of 
Shittira, on the western bank of the river, is the plain of 
Jericho, about seven by twelve miles in extent, watered by 
many streams from copious fountains, and blessed with a soil 
of exuberant fertility. Its position in a basin, as if scooped 
out in the earth, produces a climate which we have already 
noticed as proverbially called ^^ Egyptian,^^ and the spot 
might well remind the younger* portion of the Israelites, 
gazing upon it across the Jordan, of the country by the 
Nile ; for here were palms in such abundance that the city, 
Jericho, on that plain, was in those days of Moses called 
" the city of palm trees.'^^ 

We have thus a view of the physical appearance of the 
country amid which the Israelites were now situated; but we 
can have no idea of the polluting influences produced even 
by the very names of places there, or of transactions and 
scenes which the mere designations of spots must have soon 
made familiar to their minds. For the chief god of this 
region was Baal, and on those heights above the vale of 
Shittim was the city of Beth-peor, so named after scenes in 
which the lowest orgies between the two sexes, which in 
our cities are carefully concealed, were there publicly en- 
acted as a part of the worship of that god. 

It was probably during the absence of Moses in Bashan, 
or if not then, it was immediately afterward, that the Moab- 
ites put in practice a singular plan for the discomfiture of 
Israel. These people had been jealous and keen observers 
of what was transpiring to the north of that deep glen of 
the Arnon, which was separating them from the new and 
formidable invaders. They had, it is true, been in no wise 
molested, but they were distressed and anxious. The Am- 



^ Dent, xxxiv. 3. 



BALAAM. 469 

orites had been conquered ; the great hordes of Bashan had 
also yielded, or were yielding, before the mysterious Power 
which was sustaining the Israelites ; a subtle, unseen influ- 
ence seemed to be at work for these invaders. The Moab- 
ites resolved on trying to set charm against charrrij and to 
have the Israelites cursed. It was the belief in that country, 
that sorcerers and prophets had power to curse persons and 
places, so as to confound all hostile designs, to enervate 
strength and fill their enemies with fear and dismay.^ 

In this purposed effort the Moabites were joined by the 
Midianites, to w^hich people it is difficult for us to assign 
any habitation or definite country. They seem to have 
been wandering Arabs, like the Arabs of the present day, 
nomads sometimes, sometimes traders, occasionally occupying 
permanent habitations,^ and very rich in flocks and herds. 
They were the descendants of Abraham by Keturah, and 
appear to have interma];ried with their neighbors from the 
same original stock, the Ishmaelites.^ Such nomadic tribes 
are often very large, and the owners of great movable 
wealth. Mr. Graham encountered one which he estimated 
to consist of one hundred and twenty thousand persons, 
including twenty-five thousand horsemen. They migrate 
from the Hauran to the Euphrates and to Arabia ; and the 
traveller alluded to, on one occasion wishing to get the 
assistance of a tribe in his explorations, was disappointed 
by finding them just ready to start suddenly for the latter 
distant country. The Midianites and Ammonites appear to 
have been of this class of movable people ; but both drawn 
by ancient family affinities and by religion to the Moabites, 
— for all three were worshippers of Baal — and seem to 
have had their common rallying-point in Moab. All now 
joined in a common cause against the Israelites, for all 

1 See Gen. ix. 25 ; Josh. vi. 26. 
» See Gen. xxxvii. 28 ; Num. xxxi. 10. 

' In Jud. viii. 24 both seem to be comprehended under the same name. 
40 



470 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT, 

thought themselves in danger of losing their pasture- 
grcftinds and their old homes. They sent for a man of 
reputed ability, suited apparently to their present purpose ; 
for they wished to get him to curse Israel. 

In those old times, as now, there were idiosyncrasies 
among men that were thought to fit them for special occa- 
sions of supposed mysterious influences. When Athens 
was visited by a great plague B. C. 596, the citizens after 
trying all kinds of remedies, sent to Crete, for Epimenides, 
a man of reputation for sanctity and religious rites, and con- 
sidered by those people as a prophet. He came and had 
sacrifices offered, and the plague ceased ; and it was by his 
order that altars were erected in that city with the inscrip- 
tion To THE Unknown God, because he knew not to what 
God to attribute the cure. At the time we are now speak- 
ing of, a man named Balaam, living near the Euphrates,* 
had a somewhat similar reputation, which reached these 
three tribes by the Arnon ; and he seemed to be the indi- 
vidual adapted to their purpose, not, as in the case of Epi- 
menides, for curing, but for cursing. There are roads now 
directly across that intervening desert,^ and the whole of that 
region was familiar to the nomadic Midianites and Moabites. 
Accordingly, authorized messengers, consisting of "the 
elders of Moab and the elders of Midian,^' were despatched 
to Balaam " with the rewards of divination in their hands.'^ 
The chief head of this movement was Balak, king of Moab, 
who had called for Midian with the alarming cry respect- 
ing the Israelites, " Now shall this company lick up all that 
are round about us, as the ox licketh up the grass of the 
field." 

The messengers found Balaam ; and whatever the man 



* That was the meaning of "the river of the hind," Num. xxii. 5. 

* Mr. Graham saw one now commencing near this (at Salkhad, "Sal- 
chab/' Deut. ill. 10,) luid conducting to Busrah on the Euphrates. 



BALAAM. 471 

himself may have been, God employed him for his own pur- 
poses on this occasion, 

Balaam was bidden by the divine interposition not 
to accompany the messengers : " Thou shalt not curse the 
people : for they are blessed/^ The unwelcome news of 
the man's refusal was carried back to the Moabitish king, 
who grew still more earnest as he found obstacles rising in 
his w^ay. He sent another deputation larger than the other 
and consisting of yet higher princes of the kingdom, and 
with not only a pressing message, but an offer of very high 
honors : " Come therefore, I pray thee, curse me this people/^ 
The messengers were requested by Balaam, as in the former 
case, to wait till the next morning : and during the night 
permission was given him to accede to their wishes, but 
with the injunction, " The word that I shall say unto thee, 
that shalt thou do/' In the morning, taking the ass on 
which he was accustomed to ride, and accompanied by two 
servants he started on the journey ; but " the angel of the 
Lord stood in the way for an adversary against him/' The 
animal seeing the apparition, which was, however, not 
visible to the master, turned aside, but was brought back to 
the road ; and again in a narrow place, hemmed in by walls, 
the angel appeared, and the animal trying to avoid the 
apparition crushed the rider's foot against the wall. Again, 
in a place where there was no passing by, the angel appeared, 
— as before in an offensive attitude, and the animal fell to 
the earth under its master, whose rage, before vented in 
blows, now rose to an extreme height. The dumb beast 
was here gifted with speech, and uttered its complaints in 
words ; and the eyes of the master being opened to see his 
adversary with sword drawn, ^^he bowed down his head, 
and fell flat on his face." To the reasonings of the angel he 
answered, " I have sinned," " now therefore, if it displease 
thee, I will get me back again," He was bidden to go on, 



472 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

but warned now again, " Only the word that I shall speak 
unto thee, that shalt thou speak/^ 

He went, and was met near the Arnon by King Balak, 
previously informed of his approach, and impatient for an 
interview and to have the curse pronounced. To the king's 
salutation and intimations of honors that might be bestowed, 
he answered, " Lo, I am come unto thee : have I now any 
power at all to say anything ? the word that God putteth 
in my mouth, that shall I speak/^ 

They went together to one of the sacred places^ and 
offered sacrifices : and on the morrow they ascended to " the 
high places of Baal,^' where they could overlook the im- 
mense assemblages of the Israelites, scattered over the table- 
land and in the plain of Shittim below. Balaam directed 
seven altars to be built here, and had caused a bullock and 
a ram to be offered on each; and then he retired for a while 
to " an high place,'' to wait there by himself for the result. 

The impatient king stood by the smoking sacrifice, ex- 
pectant throngs all around gazing on. They were on Baal's 
high-places, and they hoped here for words of vengeance 
from their god. Over this wide extent of country, where 
the Amorites and Bashanites had erected his numerous 
altars, their enemy had spread, casting down altars and 
images with many words of reprobation and scorn upon all. 
The aged chief of these invaders had denounced Baal him- 
self; and his elders and followers had taken up the cry of 
hatred against this old worship of their god and of Ash- 
teroth ; — but now, it was hoped, the time of vengeance would 
come. Baal would speak out in words of cursing that 
would effectually counteract the mysterious influences work- 
ing in favor of those strangers, — the cloudy pillar by day, 
the fiery pillar by night, resting like a withering power 
upon the military strength of the inhabitants. Baal would 



^ Kirjath-huzotb, literally, city of streets. 



BALAAM, 473 

declare for himself; the strength of the enemy would be 
dried up under the direful magic words of their god ; and 
then, to Moabite and Midianite the time of full revenge 
would come. 

With thoughts such as these the people watched by the 
altar for the return of Balaam, and saw him at last appear 
and stand by the sacrifices, and with the silence that only 
such awe can beget, they listened for him to utter the curse. 
He spoke — 

" Balak the king of Moab hath brought me from Aram, 
out of the mountains of the east, saying, Come, curse me 
Jacob, and come, defy Israel. How shall I curse whom 
God hath not cursed? or how shall I defy whom the Lord 
hath not defied ? From the top of the rocks I see him, and 
from the hills I behold him : lo, the people shall dwell 
alone, and shall not be reckoned among the nations. Who 
can count the dust of Jacob and the number of the fourth 
part of Israel ? Let me die the death of the righteous, and 
let my last end be like his.^^ 

They were horrified ! Balak spoke out the feelings of all 
in a bitter cry of complaint, and was answered by Balaam 
sorrowfully and unwillingly, but in words equally incisive as 
the former : " Must I not take heed to speak that which the 
Lord hath put in my mouth V^ 

The king took him, for another effort, to a still higher 
spot, in hopes that the god would there be more favorable ; 
for the immense multitudes of their enemy would there be 
more fully seen, and perhaps the god might be thus stimu- 
lated to a better response. At the top of an elevation called 
Pisgah, seven altars were again built, and a bullock and 
ram offered on each ; and the king was again left by the 
sacrifices, while Balaam retired as before. When he again 
appeared, the eager question was put to him, " What hath 
the Lord spoken ?" and the reply was horrifying as in the 
former case : '' God is not man, that he should lie, neither 

40* 



474 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

the son of man, that he should repent : hath he said and 
shall he not do it ? or hath he spoken and shall he not make 
it good ? Behold, I have received commandment to bless ; 
and he hath blessed, and I cannot reverse it,^^ and he pro- 
ceeded with like remarks, declaring, '' Surely there is no 
enchantment against Jacob, neither is there any divination 
against Israel/^ 

The crushing anguish of the king is seen best in his own 
words, '' Neither curse them at all, nor bless them at all.'^ 
But again a hope rose in him, though full of fear respecting 
the result, and mingled with a deep despondency. There 
was Mount Peor, where was the temple noted most of all 
for the diso-ustino; scenes of licentiousness in honor of their 
god; and to this place Balaam was now conducted. Their 
god, they hoped amid their growing despair, might possibly 
there give them a favorable response. Here the same num- 
ber of sacrifices of the same kind were made ; but this time 
Balaam did not withdraw to receive his answer. He be- 
lieved it to be useless ; and so, standing by the altars, he 
looked abroad over the widely-spread tents of Israel. The 
company around were afraid now of his speech ; were afraid 
to gaze on his face, lighted up as if by a strange fervor, — on 
his staring eyes, as if seeing sights not seen by them, — on 
his changed expression, as if the mystic scenes rising before 
him in his trance were horrifying to himself. And seeing 
him they dreaded to hear his words. These were in the 
same poetic phraseology as before: " Balaam, the son of 
Peor hath said, and the man whose eyes are open hath said : 
he hath said which heard the words of God, which saw the 
vision of the Almighty, falling into a trance, but having 
his eyes oj)en : How goodly are thy tents, O Jacob, and thy 
tabernacles, O Israel !'' and proceeded in the same strain of 
])rophecy respecting the future of these enemies of Balak. 
The feelings of the latter had been verging toward an angry 
explosion, and they now broke out in reproaches, and a 



BALAAM. 475 

warning, " Now flee thou to thy place/^ with a hint at the 
honors which he had intended to bestow. The reply was 
that the king had been forewarned that Balaam would speak 
only as God should dictate ; and then were added prophecies 
respecting Moab, and Edom and Amalek and the Kenites, 
which could leave to Balak or his friends no items of hope. 

Balaam had been foiled in his hopes of honor and wealth ; 
he had been made to speak involuntarily words of blessing 
where he would have been glad to curse ; he had himself 
been filled with chagrin at his three efforts, with altars and 
sacrifices ; and he now retired from it all with as much 
grief as Balak could feel. But a plan then suggested itself 
to him, which he thought might succeed. It was truly an 
execrable one, but in his mortification he was ready for any- 
thing. The last place of sacrifice, full of licentious surround- 
ings, perhaps suggested the idea to him : he laid it before the 
king and it was adopted. It was easy in that country of 
worshippers of Baal-Peor and Ashteroth to find agents for 
its execution ; to execute it would seem to those people to 
be a patriotic deed. 

The plan was to entice the Israelites away from God, and 
to draw them over to Baal, by means of the licentious Midian- 
ite women. God had interposed for his people here and in 
Bashan : that cloud and that pillar of fire were visible proofs 
of his presence: -he had turned purposed cursing into bless- 
ing : but if a barrier could be interposed between the Israel- 
ites and him ; if they could be brought to worship Baal 
and Ashteroth, and their protector be changed to an enemy, 
then these vast hordes of hated strangers would be them- 
selves made the causes of their own defeat and ruin. Re- 
venge so got would be doubly sweet. Balaam suggested 
his plan^ and it was adopted : he left for his distant home, 
but the means were immediately put into execution. 



1 Num. xxxi. 16. 



476 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

The Israelites, during all this, were resting unconsciously 
in their tents, and enjoying the ease and repose of their new 
encamping-places, on the heights or down in the vale of 
Shittim among its acacia groves. They had tried their arms 
against formidable warlike hosts, and had conquered : by 
their side was the Promised Land spread out before their 
vision : they believed that they had only to cross the river 
and it would all be theirs. Their vigilance was relaxed, 
their souls were becoming enervated by indulgence; the 
whole country about them was suggestive of licentious 
thoughts, which found too many answering sensations in 
their own natures during this ease and idleness. In this 
state of things they perceived Midianite women coming 
among them singly or by companies, and respecting them 
saw no occasion for alarm. Had they been men of any 
nation, no matter what their professions of friendship 
might have been, the apprehensions of the rulers and espe- 
cially of Moses would have been excited ; but the danger 
here stole into the camp in such a disguised shape and was 
so carefully concealed that the mischief was done before it 
had been suspected by the leader. The arts of these women 
not only led off the men into crime, but they were insinua- 
ting the poison of heathenish belief among the whole con- 
gregation of Israel. 

Moses waked up, by and by, to a perception of the mighty 
evil in the camp. He had never been of a suspicious, un- 
charitable nature, and his attention had lately been divided 
also by the newly-acquired possessions of his people and 
directed to measures for holding them in safety. These 
recent proceedings might therefore very easily escape his 
scrutiny, especially as the abettors of them would court 
concealment, and be on their guard against exciting his dis- 
pleasure. He then might well be horrified, as he was, 
when the nature and the extent of the wickedness began to 
be disclosed to him. The plot carried out by these artful, 



BALAAM. 477 

lascivious women had been successful to such an extent that 
the abominable scenes in the former worship at Beth-peor, 
had been reenacted now by his own people, and the sacri- 
fices and feasts to these heathen gods were beginning to be 
re-established by the Israelites. 

The fiery indignation of the leader was in harmony with 
God^s order on the occasion : '^ Take all the heads of the 
people, and hang them up before the Lord against the sun 
[their Baal-god], that the fierce anger of the Lord may be 
turned away from Israel ;^' to which was added, " Slay ye 
every one his men that were joined unto Baal-peor/^ 

It was done : for a sudden revulsion of feeling through- 
out the camp was greatly aided by a plague which had 
broken out among them, caused evidently by the divine 
displeasure. Twenty-four thousand people perished amid 
its swift ravages : the remainder, pale and trembling, — no 
one knowing where it would end, and all feeling the justice 
of the judgment, — hastened to the front of the Tabernacle, 
and with tears deplored their wickedness. An act of dar- 
ing outrage, committed insolently, even there before them 
by one of their nobles, and promptly punished by Phinehas, 
son of Eleazar, was the last of those scenes in this, the last 
of the rebellions against God while under the government 
of Moses. The plague, at this last act, was stayed. 

One more deed remained for this aged leader : after that 
he was to go to his long rest. " Avenge the children of 
Israel of the Midianites,^^ said the divine order : ^^ after- 
ward shalt thou be gathered unto thy people.'^ We are 
reading in this Bible narrative a record in which the 
divine hand is seen, and reasons given for its interference. 
All transactions among nations are marked by strong visita- 
tions of the Almighty Ruler, — nations suddenly subverted, 
and all, both old and young, perishing, — catastrophes by 
earthquakes or famines, where all alike die terrible deaths ; 
— we acknowledge them to be by the divine, omnipotent 



47^ LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

power, and though we cannot see yet, we recognize the 
rightfuhiess of his sway, mysterious to us. In this present 
record we do see, — still however darkly, as men must ever 
see when marking the visitations of God, but we see enough 
in these records, to enable us to believe that, in all others, 
God^s hand rules in righteousness, and for the general 
welfare." 

In this case a thousand men were taken from each of the 
tribes of Israel and sent against the Midianites. Battles 
ensued, in which the latter were defeated with great slaughter, 
and in one of these, Balaam, who had come out to the 
assistance of his friends, was himself slain. The women 
and children of the Midianites were taken alive, but some 
of the former, probably as a warning to all worshippers of 
Baal-Peor, and against such arts as were practised on the 
Israelites, were put to death. The immense number of 
sheep and cattle taken as the results of these battles, shows 
the nomadic character of this people, who had, however, in 
certain places, permanent habitations : the latter were de- 
stroyed. 



CHAPTER L. 
DEATH OF MOSES. 



" r\ LORD GOD, thou liast begun to show thy servant 
vy thy greatness and thy mighty hand : for what God is 
there in heaven or on earth that can do according to thy 
works, and according to thy might? I pray thee let me go 
over, and see the good land that is beyond Jordan, that 
goodly mountain, and Lebanon." 

— Such was the appeal now of the aged man, as standing 



I 



DEATH OF MOSES. 479 

on those heights overlooking the Jordan and the country- 
bey ond it, he felt an earnest yearning to set foot on that 
Promised Land, the end of such long wanderings and of so 
many trials, and at last so near. He wished also to see his 
people safely across that stream, to feel himself among them 
in their new homes, and to witness their possession, if only 
of a small portion of the country, and but for a few days. 
Then he would be ready to close his eyes on all the world 
and to depart for another. It might be that there would 
also be fighting just beyond the river; for that large walled 
city of Jericho was confronting them, and that immense 
garden-like plain would not be readily yielded by its 
inhabitants. How beautiful that plain was ! how inviting, 
with its groves of feathery palms ! its great stretches of 
intense verdure, its signs of fertility and abundance ! Even 
Moses, himself, as he gazed upon the palm groves, the sight 
of which carried him back to his young, fresh life in Egypt, 
may have felt the longings which old associations bring 
back, and have wished to sit, if only for a few hours, once 
more in the palm tree shade, with the rustling of the beau- 
tiful feathery coronet overhead. 

So he prayed : but the prayer was denied. The answer, 
was: 

'' Let it suffice thee : speak no more unto me of this 
matter. Get thee up into the top of Pisgah, and lift up 
thine eyes westward and northward, and southward and 
eastward, and behold it with thine eyes . for thou shalt 
not go over this Jordan." ^ 

There is an exactness and a firmness of determination in 
all God's dealings with the Jews, as shown in this Mosaic 
record, which is constantly meeting us with striking force as 
we read. They were God's chosen people ; favored and 
blessed as no other people had ever been ; and the picture 



1 Deut. iii. 24-27. 



480 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

sketched by his own hand of his treatment of them is ap- 
propriately beautiful: "As an eagle stirreth up her nest, 
fluttereth over her young, spreadeth abroad her wings, 
taketh them, beareth them on her wings, so the Lord alone 
did lead them -^ — and yet, with all this, there is a sternness 
and unyieldingness in retribution which may very well 
make us pause and think. If with all his love to his favorite 
nation, and his tenderness and care, there was this unyield- 
ingness, how can other nations, when transgressing the laws 
of righteousness, hope to escape ? And again, more wonder- 
ful far than this peculiar regard to the Israelites, has been 
Christ^s regard which has led him, God himself, to come 
and die as a ransom for the transgressors. Unfathomable 
was that love of Jesus ; and yet Christ's words, even during 
this mission when he came to die for us, have a firmness and 
decision respecting transgressors that equal any thing in the 
laws or acts spread before us in the Mosaic record. The 
same lips which declared that he, the Divinity, had come to 
seek and to save that which was lost ; and that he in our 
nature would suffer for us and be lifted up on the cross that 
all the world might come unto him; and that God so loved 
the world as to give his Son to die, said also with em- 
phasis that " Till heaven and earth pass, one jot or one tittle 
shall in no wise pass from the law till all be fulfilled ;" and 
also drew the scene — far more frightful than any thing 
sketched by Moses — of the final Judge declaring, " Depart 
from me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire, prepared for the 
devil and his angels. '^ 

God is a being of infinite love and compassion ; and he 
surely was so to the Israelites; yet in the parting address 
now made by Moses, they were told, " For the Lord thy God 
is a consuminiz; fire, even a jealous God." Who can wonder 
that he was a jealous God, when the antagonistic heathen- 
ism around was productive of such scenes as we have just 
been only hinting at, in the temples of Baal and Ashteroth? 



DEATH OF MOSES, 48 1 

As respects the unyieldingness of the judgments that 
come from God's hand, we must remember that he is 
the ruler not over a community alone, but over the earth, 
and still more over the universe of matter and of spirit. 

The petition of Moses to be allowed to cross the river 
with his people was almost pathetic ; but his transgression 
at Kadesh had been open and marked ; and the higher and 
more distinguished the man, the firmer was the decree and 
the doom. 

After the refusal he set himself to work, to make the 
final organization of the people and arrangements for his 
separation from them. Reuben and Gad and the half-tribe 
of Manasseh, who were all peculiarly of a nomadic character 
and had large flocks and herds, had been captivated by the 
adaptedness of the region now about them for their interests, 
and had requested that it might be assigned to them; which 
had been done, on condition that their soldiers should go 
over with the rest and assist in any needed warlike demon- 
strations west of the Jordan. Reuben had the more 
southern portion, and the other two received the country 
of Bashan and about Gilead. Individuals (a prince from 
each tribe, together with Eleazar and Joshua) were desig- 
nated by the divine authority, for making the allotments 
across the river, after possession there should have been 
gained. 

Then the feelings of the great leader returned again to 
the fear that was continually upon him, — that the people 
would desert God, a fear which their late apostasy had 
served so much to strengthen. God would then desert 
them ; and in Jehovah, as he knew, was their only hope. 
He recapitulated before the multitudes what had been done 
for them by the divine help, making a review, in doing 
this, of their history since the departure from Egypt. He 
promised them abundant blessings in the future, if they 
would be faithful to their heavenly Protector : and the same 

41 



482 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

spirit of prophecy which dictated his sublime language de- 
clared also^ if they should be unfaithful, the fearfulness of the 
scenes awaiting them — where it was stated they would be " au 
astonishment, a proverb, and a by-word, among all nations 
whither the Lord shall lead thee. . . . And the Lord 
shall scatter thee among all people, from the one end of the 
earth even unto the other. . . . And among these nations 
shalt thou find no ease, neither shall the sole of thy foot 
have rest : but the Lord shall give thee there a trembling 
heart, and failing of eyes, and sorrow of mind. And thy 
life shall hang in doubt before thee ; and thou shalt fear 
day and night, and shalt have none assurance of thy life. 
In the morning thou shalt say, Would God it were even ! 
and at even thou shalt say. Would God it were morning ! 
for the fear of thy heart w^herewith thou shalt fear, and 
for the sight of thine eyes which thou shalt see." To us, 
who can now look back on what was to them the future, 
how much this prophecy, written three thousand three hun- 
dred and eighty years ago, reads like history! He added, 
" I call heaven and earth to record this day against you, 
that I have set before you life and death, blessing and 
cursing : therefore choose life, that both thou and thy 
seed may live : that thou mayest love the Lord thy God, 
and that thou mayost obey his voice, and that thou 
mayest cleave unto him (for he is thy life, and the length 
of thy days), that thou mayest dwell in the land which 
the Lord sware unto thy fathers, to Abraham, to Isaac, 
and to Jacob, to give them." There seems to run through 
all these last words, a mournful feeling, as if Moses was too 
prescient to be quiet under it, as respected the future. 

The divine communication now announced to him, " Be- 
hold, thy days approach that thou must die," and directed 
him to call Joshua; and then the two went together into the 
Tabernacle, where now the pillar of cloud came and "stood 
over the d^r." The people were here given into Joshua's 



V^ 



DEATH OF MOSES, 483 

charge. The leadership by the great man^ who had done 
his duty so long and so faithfully, was ended. 

^^ Give ear, O ye heavens, and I will speak ; and hear, O 
earth, the words of my mouth -P — they are among the last 
words of Moses that we shall hear, — for he was to die on 
that day — and these were by the divine dictation his fare- 
well hymn before the assembled multitudes. He and Joshua 
had come out of the Tabernacle, and they stood before the 
people, the old man and the young man, side by side ; and 
upon them all the eyes of the congregation were fixed. 
They knew that they were to lose him. He was before 
them, most venerable in age; his successor was there, a 
trustworthy man, but far less experienced ; and all that 
soundness of judgment which can arise only from experi- 
ence would be needed in their near future. How often, in 
the past, had that aged and now doubly beloved man stood 
between them and God's vengeance, threatened for their 
sins, and had warded off the blow ! There could be no such 
intercessor now ; and they, so weak and so given to falling ! 
They gazed on that face, so marked with age and care and 
griefs which they themselves had caused ; they noted well 
the grandeur of expression, now all lighted up by the 
divine afflatus in his song : — they gazed, and would have 
kept him among them — would have led him across the 
river, — have asked his counsel there — and have kept his 
love still among them. 

But they understood that this could not be. 

He gave now his blessing to each of the tribes individ- 
ually ; and then included all in one general benediction : 
'^ Happy art thou, O Israel : who is like unto thee, O people 
saved by the Lord, the shield of thy help, and who is the 
sword of thy excellency ? and thine enemies shall be found 
liars unto thee; and thou shalt tread upon their high 
places.''^ 

^ Of their false gods. 



484 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

This last scene appears to have been at the great plain by 
the Jordan, where he could stand on the lower part of the 
mountain, and be visible to all below. Then he ascended 
•the mountain, and having reached the heights above, he 
went alone to the loftiest ridge, Pisgah, and to Nebo, the 
highest point on that ridge. There he gazed over the very 
wide scene spread out on every side, — to the Mediterranean, 
far in the west, to Lebanon and the snowy Hermon on the 
north, to where, on the south, the landscape faded away into 
the desert of the long wanderings, and on the east over the 
table-land of Moab and toward Bashan. Across the Jor- 
dan were vast stretches of landscape, — hills and plains in- 
termingled — extending off till all took an indistinct charac- 
ter, except where here and there a mountain peak rose up 
in greater prominence. Below, flowed the river, winding 
along in a silvery line, and then discharging itself into the 
Dead Sea ; and upon its banks, spread out invitingly the 
great green plain of Jericho, with its palm tops waving, as 
if the breeze and the foliage were inviting the spectator 
over. But he was not to go. 

God was with the aged man on that mountain-top, and 
there spoke to him words of kindness and assurance. Then 
came the end : 

" So Moses, the servant of the Lord died there in the 
land of Moab, according to the word of the Lord. 

"And he buried him in a valley in the land of Moab, 
over against Bcth-Peor : but no man kuoweth of his sepul- 
chre unto this day." 



JORDAN CROSSED. 485 



CHAPTER LI. 
JORDAN CROSSED. 

THE Israelites mourned for their late great leader thirty- 
days, with that sincere and deep sorrow which people feel 
when they have lost a friend on whom they could safely 
lean in all trials, and whose sure, true love and sustaining 
arm cannot be replaced by any one on the earth. They all 
knew what fulness of reliance could always be placed on 
him who was now gone ; how large and thorough had been 
his knowledge, how profound his wisdom, how sympathetic 
his heart, how forbearing and how self-sacrificing he had 
been in all his acts. They had just seen him go up the 
mountain, and pass off alone from among them ; all else 
was shrouded in mystery. Sometimes they looked, thinking 
that he might return possibly in some other form ; or that 
he might on Nebo have even obtained, at the last, a re- 
versal of his doom, and might yet be their leader, if only 
for a little while : sometimes, in the night or in the day, a 
sudden appearance of some one at a distance, in the uncer- 
tainty of recognition, made them start in hope : sometimes a 
voice far or near seemed to have his tones, and set their 
hearts palpitating. But he came not again. Day after day 
and week after week passed in this mourning, and the mys- 
tery was never cleared up. They knew, at last, that God 
had surely taken their old, tried, sincere friend, and left 
them alone. Yet not alone; for the cloud still rested over 
the Tabernacle by day ; the pillar of fire still shone by 
night; and God^s special presence was still known to be 
with them for good, if they would be true to him. They 
felt the necessity now, more than ever, of keeping close to 
God. 

41 * 



4S6 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

Joshua — probably during this time of mourning — sent 
out spies to examine the land which they were so soon to 
invade. These men had a narrow escape from death in 
their difficult and dangerous mission ; for Ihe inhabitants 
across the Jordan were keenly apprehensive and on the 
alert. But the spies finally returned in safety, bringing en- 
couraging intelligence. They said, " Truly the Lord hath 
delivered into our hands all the land ; for even all the in- 
habitants of the country do faint because of us.^^ It had 
been declared to them privately in Jericho, " We have heard 
how the Lord dried up the water of the Red Sea for you, 
when ye came out of Egypt ; and what ye did unto the two 
kings of the Amorites that were on the other side of Jor- 
dan, Sihon and Og, whom ye utterly destroyed. And as 
soon as we heard these things our hearts did melt, neither 
did there remain any more courage in any man, because of 
you : for the Lord your God, he is God in heaven above 
and in earth beneath.^^ 

Preparations were therefore now made for crossing the 
river. 

It was evident to all that without the divine aid, the 
crossing was impossible ; for the stream at this spot oppo- 
site to them is not fordable, and the fords higher up, practi- 
cable at other seasons, could not at that particular time of 
the year be available. For it Avas the time of' barley har- 
vest, in their spring season, when the melting snows at 
Hermon send down a flood that raises the stream beyond the 
fullest capacity of its banks.' 

The Jordan, after passing through the Lake of Galilee, 
continues along in a deep hollow, called by the present 
natives d-Ghor, or "The Depression," a name very signifi- 
cant of the chasm-like, sunk region in which it flows. The 
Lake of Galilee is six hundred and fifty-two feet below the 



' Josh. iii. 15. 



JORDAN CROSSED. 487 

level of the Mediterranean, and the Dead Sea, as already 
noticed, one thousand three hundred and twelve feet. Be- 
tween the two is this depression or ghor, five or six miles 
wide and sunk from one thousand to one thousand two 
hundred feet below the neighboring country. Then in el- 
Ghor, running lengthwise in it, is a still lower depression 
of about fifty feet, having a breadth of four hundred yards : 
and winding about in this latter is the channel of the river. 
The stream has an average width of fifty-six yards, with com- 
monly a depth of water from three to five feet, the bottom 
rocky or sandy according to the flow, and sometimes varied 
by cataracts. The distance between the Lake of Galilee 
and Dead Sea is but sixty miles, and the descent being six 
hundred and sixty feet, there would at all times be a great 
rush of water, if it were not for the extremely tortuous 
course of the stream, which is so great as to make its entire 
length equal to two hundred miles. The immediate bank 
of the river, at the plain of Jericho, is ordinarily a steep 
descent of six feet down to the water, and is fringed on 
either side with a thick growth of willows, tamarisks, 
oleanders and cane. The width of the Jordan is there nar- 
rowed considerably, the depth is ordinarily ten or twelve 
feet, and the current is at all times rapid. 

But at the time for the crossing of the Israelites, the 
depth was much greater, for the flood was up to the edge 
of the banks and in places overflowing ; and the water was 
now surging along with correspondent unusual velocity. 

Such was the river which the Israelites were at this time 
contemplating from the vale of Shittim or the heights 
above, and which they were preparing to cross. Only God 
could carry them over, and they knew it. He was supreme 
over all nature ; he had led these people already across the 
Red Sea in safety. Still they might well question their 
hearts — these multitudes, w4io had so often murmured 
against him and showed always such a quickness to rebel. 



488 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT, 

Would he help them now ? — They knew, however, that they 
had no other helper. 

Therefore, when Joshua at the proper time sent directions 
among them for their action, they yielded a ready obedi- 
ence; wondering, however, watching, deeply earnest, and 
with many a querying among themselves, — sometimes also 
with palpitating hearts and with the shrinkings of natural 
fear. For it was not easy to look down with other sensations 
on that swift rush of heaving, discolored water bearing on 
its bosom the wrecks of things torn from its banks in re- 
gions far above : it was a formidable stream to any one, and 
especially so to the younger portion of the Israelites, who 
had never beheld a river before. It seemed as if it might 
be a grave already prepared for the rebellious and wicked 
among them ; and who of their number had come out from 
these late scenes of Baal-Peor and the Midianite tempta- 
tions to idolatry, with hearts pure and clean ? 

So they gazed and felt : but they knew soon that the time 
for crossing over was arrived ; for officers of the host 
passed among them warning all, by Joshua's directions, to 
prepare three days' extra supply of food ; '^ for in three 
days ye shall pass over this Jordan, to go in and possess the 
land which the Lord your God giveth you to possess it.'' 
The manna had continued still to come down at night, in 
its peculiar quiet mode of giving them sustenance, as it had 
done for nearly forty years, but their leader probably 
had prescience that it would cease immediately after their 
crossing the stream. In addition to it, the rich plains of 
Moab and Bashan had furnished them with corn ; and with 
this latter they could easily make such preparation of extra 
provision for three days. 

The encampments on the licights and the lower slopes 
about Shittim were now broken up, and the people were 
brought down toward the borders of the stream. Directions 



JORDAN CROSSED. 489 

were then given, " Sanctify yourselves : for to-morrow the 
Lord will do great wonders among you/^ 

And so the morrow came, the beginning of the great 
and eventful day. 

Orders were now given for the multitudes to fall back, so 
as to leave a vacant space of about three-fourths of a mile 
about the Ark of the Covenant. The ark was ordinarily 
carried by the Levites who were not of the house of Aaron, 
but on this occasion it was to be borne by priests. 

With this wide space kept open, the people on each little 
elevation were able to see every movement made with the 
ark. They gazed with quick-beating hearts and bated 
breath as they saw the priests take it up, and saw them 
advancing directly toward the river, the deep, surging 
stream still rushing impetuously by. They saw them reach 
the water till the feet of the bearers were dipping into it. 
Then they saw the current borne back, and they drew a 
long breath of relief. Quickly a murmur of deep joy and 
thankfulness spread through those immense hosts. They 
saw the waters up the stream held and restrained and 
spreading over the great valley far above; while at its lower 
part the river retreated also, and the deep bed of the Jor- 
dan was laid bare. 

The priests bearing the ark descended to the middle 
of the channel, and stood there ; and now the great mul- 
titudes were bidden to advance and to cross to the other 
side. Kone could doubt God^s power there ; all had clear 
assurance now of the fulness and certainty of the heavenly 
aid, and all advanced cheerfully and confidently to and 
across the channel. It would take many hours and a long 
extent of dried-up river^ for such a large number of people, 
with their flocks and herds to cross over ; but until all were 

1 Both have been estimated — the time at eight hours, and the width of 
the hosts crossing, with their baggage and cattle, at two miles. See " Pa- 
lestine Past and Present, by Kev. Henry S. Osborn, A.M." 



490 LIFE-SCENES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

over and safe on the western side, the channel was still kept 
dry — the waters being restrained above and below by the 
power of their Almighty Protector and Guardian. 

The ark and the priests bearing it still remained at their 
first position in the middle of the river-bed. Twelve men, 
one out of each tribe, who had been previously selected, 
were now directed to take, each man a stone from the chan- 
nel and to carry it up to the dry land, to be kept there as a 
memorial and a subject of teaching to future generations — 
'^ That the waters of Jordan were cut off before the Ark of 
the Covenant of the Lord ; when it passed over Jordan, the 
waters of Jordan were cut off.'^ They were also to set up 
twelve stones in the middle of the channel, where the 
priests bearing the ark had stood. When this was done, 
the priests themselves were directed by Joshua to come up, 
bringing the ark on their shoulders. They did so, and 
when their feet reached the brink on this western side, the 
waters rushed along again, surging and sweeping by as they 
had previously done. 

They had at last entered the Promised Land. 

Amid the general congratulations of the vast multitudes 
so full of joy at their safe transit, and amid the words of 
cheer to each other respecting the future, and the brightness 
of hope from this new assurance of God's favor, — amid all 
the scene of great happiness on that western bank, we can- 
not but turn now to look back over the river, to that high 
mountain where rest the remains of the recent great leader, 
left in solitude and an unknown grave. Fitting, however, 
for his burial was that elevated ground overlooking all Ca- 
naan; and fitting was the interment when angels performed 
the rites for one who, though of earth had received on his face 
the impress from God's own glory ; and fitting was the end 
of him, who after so many proclamations of God's law for 
men, left in his death a proof of the stern unyieldingness 



JORDAN CROSSED, 49 1 

of this law exacting its penalty for a single transgression, 
even from him the most favored of human beings. 

Thus he rested in his mysterious burying place. But long 
afterward he was seen on earth, when for a brief period the 
veil which obstructs mortal vision was lifted, and heaven^s 
full glory was beheld surrounding Christ on the Mount of 
Transfiguration, while amid that glory were seen Moses and 
Elias, drawn from heaven into the presence of their and our 
Lord. It was all only a short flashing out upon our earth 
of the supernal brightness, in which Christ^s face ^^ did 
shine as the sun ;" but even those few moments have left a 
beaming light enduring still on our earth, and to last through 
all future time. The scene was many years ago, but as we 
now gaze at it through the experience of centuries of results, 
we are entranced by the vision ; — the face all gloriously 
bright like the sun, and also as glorious in goodness; and 
near by, the face of the hero-prophet who had perilled life, as 
Christ was now perilling his, for righteousness' sake ; and the 
face of the great giver of the Law that was to be ^^ our school- 
master to bring us to Christ.'^ Memory is quick sometimes ; 
and as we gaze, there come sweeping over it now those long 
scenes of trial in the heart of the lawgiver, and the futility 
of all effort to make men righteous by obedience ; while in 
Christ we see Love that makes him the great substitute for 
us in penalties, the great sacrifice, by which we can be 
saved, while God's eternal Law is kept unsullied in its high 
place of sacredness and power. 



THE END. 



INDEX. 



Aaron, 258. Commissioned with Mo- 
ses, 290. Made high priest, 385. 
Doomed, 436. His death, 442. 

Abdallatif, 207. 

Abihu consumed, 387. 

Abimelech, 96, 142. 

Abiram, 422. 

Abraham introduced, 18. Called, 60. 
In Egypt, 70. As a warrior, 87. 
His name changed, 94. Goes to 
Gerar, 96. Directed to sacrifice 
Isaac, 105. Sends for a wife for 
Isaac, 129. His death, 132. 

Aholiab, 379. 

Ain el Ain, 403. 

Akabah, gulf of, 400. 

Alphabets, how made, 114, etc. 

Alphabets, exhibited, 121. 

Amalekites, 353, 416, 418. 

Ammonites, 447. 

Amorites, 448. 

Angels, visit to Abraham, 94: 

Apion, 75. 

Apis, bull-god, 190. 

Arab hospitality, 34, etc. 

Arab women, 35, 42. 

Arabs, their origin, 92, 101. 

Arabs, never subdued, 92. 

Arabah, Wady, 400. 

Argob, 459. 

Arish, Wady, 401. 

Ark of Covenant, 383. 

Arnon, river, 447, 448. 

Ashteroth, 57, 64, 475. 

Ashteroth, bust of, in alto-relievo, 465. 

Astronomy in Chaldea, 52. In 
Egypt, 265. 

Avaris, 76, 282. 



Baal, 57, 465, 468, 472. 

Balaam, 470. Sent for to curse Israel, 

470. Final plot, 475. Killed in 

battle, 478. 
Balak, king of Moab, 472. Tries to 

have Israel cursed, 473, etc. 
Bashan, 451. 

Battle with the Amalekites, 354, 418. 
Bedawin, described, 28. 
42 



Beersheba, described, 20. "Why its 

name, 101. 
Benjamin born, 176. Taken to Egypt, 

225. 
Bethel, 67, 80, 156, 175. Why so 

called, 157. 
Beth-peor, 468, 477, 484. 
Bezaleel, 379. 

Birth-right, its privileges, 140. 
Birth-right, sold by Esau, 140. 
Bitumen at southern end of Dead 

Sea, 83. 
Blasphemy punished, 388. 
Boils, plague of, 301. 
Budding of Aaron's rod, 426. 



Caleb, 405, 410. 

Chaldea, where, 48, 55. 

Champollion's discovery, 126. 

Chedorlaomer, 51, 86. 

Cherubims, 383. 

Circumcision ordained, 94. 

Copts, descendants of the ancient 

Egyptian race, 116. 
Copts, their language like that of the 

hieroglyphics, 116. 
Covenant between God and Abraham, 

90. 
Cursing, ancient belief respecting, 

469. 



Darkness, plague of, 304. 

Dathan, 422. 

Dead Sea, 82. Composition of its 

water, 83. 
Deborah, 175. 
Decalogue given, 371. 
Demotic (Egyptian characters), 125, 

128. 
Desert of Sin, 337. 
Deserts of Paran and Sur, 400, 428. 
Doom of the Israelites, 414. 
Doom of Moses and Aaron, 436. 
Dothan, 180. 



Edom, 431. 



493 



494 



INDEX. 



Edrei, Og's capital, 461. 
Education in Egypt, 264. 
Egyptian hosts destroyed, 325. 
Eleazar, 388. 
Elim, fountain of, 335. 
Encampments of Israelites, mode of, 

393. 
English alphabet, origin of, 122. 
Ephod, 385. 
Epimenides, 470. 
Er-Rahah, plain of, 361. 
Esau, 139. Sells his birth-right, 140. 

Takes Hittite wives, 144. Goes to 

Edom, 152. Meeting between him 

and Jacob, 172. 
Etham, 318. 
Exodus, 313. 
Ezion-gaber, 430. 



Famines in Egypt, 207, etc. 
Famine of A. D. 1199 described, 

210, etc. 
Feasts of Passover, Tabernacles and 

Pentecost ordained, 392. 
Feiran, Wady, 276, 344. 
Fiery serpents sent, 443. 
First-born in Egypt slain, 312. 
Flies, plague of, 299. 
Frogs, plague of, 299. 



Geological formations at the southern 
end of Dead Sea, 82. 

Genealogies connected with Abra- 
ham, 133. 

Ghuweir, "Wady ("king's highway"), 
436. 

Golden calf at Sinai, 374. 

Goshen, 235. 

Goshen given to the Israelites, 239. 

Graham, Cyril, his explorations in 
The Haurun, 457. 

Grapes of Eshcol, 409. 



Hagar, as concubine, 91. Sent off, 

98. 
Hail, plague of, 301. 
Hall of columns at Thebes, 259. 
Ilametic family, 65. 
Ilaran, where, 61. 
Ilaun'm, 454. 
Ilazoroth, 398. 

Head-dresses of Egyptians, 188. 
Hebrew alphabet, original one, 121, 

123. 
Hebrew alphabet, more modern, 123. 
Hebron, 85. 
Heliopolis, 203. 



Hieratic writing, 119, 128. 

Hieroglyphics explained, 117, etc. 

Hill of salt at Dead Sea, 82. 

Horeb, 357. 

Hor, Mount, 431, 439. 

Horus I., 248. 

Hyksos, 76. 



Idolatry, its supposed origin, 56. 
Ignorance in those times, 93. 
Immortality of the soul not noticed 

by Moses, and why, 252. 
Isaac born, 97. Goes to Gerar, 141. 

His death, 176. 
Ishmael, 92. Sent off, 98. 
Israel, the name given, 172. 
Israelites reduced to slavery in 

Egypt, 252. 
Ithm, Wady, 444. 



Jabbok, river, 171, 462. 

Jacob, 139. Steals his father's bless- 
ing, 148. Meaning of his name, 
139. His dream, 156. At Haran, 
158, etc. Flight from Haran, 164. 
At Shechem, 173. At Hebron, 177. 
Goes to Egypt, 235. Before Pha- 
raoh, 239. His death, 243. 

Japhetic family, 65. 

Jealousy, female, in Arab tents, 39. 

Jebel Musa, 362. 

Jebel Sooksafe, 363. 

Jerafeh, Wady, 401, 403. 

Jericho, plain of, 468, 479. 

Jethro, 274, 356. His advice to Mo- 
ses, 356. 

Jordan, river described, 486. Crossed, 
489. 

Joseph born, 161. Is the favorite, 177. 
Sold to the Ishmaelites, 182. Sold 
to Potiphar, 187. Tempted, 193. 
Imprisoned, 194. Interprets Pha- 
raon's dreams, 198. Made chief 
ruler, 202. Meeting with his bro- 
thers, 219. His death, 246. 

Joshua, 354. Made leader of the Is- 
raelites, 482. Sends spies to exam- 
ine Canaan, 486. 



Kadesh-barnea, 40. 
Keturnh, wife to Abraham, 133. 
Kneph, Egyptian god, 202. 
Korah, 422. 



Laban, 158, etc. 
Leah, 160. 



INDEX. 



495 



Leadership given to Joshua, 482. 

Learning among the Egyptians, 264. 

Lejah, 460. 

Lentiles, 140. 

Leprosy, Miriam affected by it, 400. 

Lepsius' mission to Egypt, 127. 

Locusts, plague of, 302. 

Loftus, W. K., his explorations, 50. 

Lot, 58. Separation between him and 
Abraham, 81. Carried into slavery, 
87. . Escapes from the conflagation 
in Siddim, 96. 

Lying among the Arabs, 72. 



Machpelah, cave of, 112, 135. 

Maimonides, 56. 

Mamre, 86. 

Manetho, 75. 

Manna sent, 340. 

Marah, fountain, 333. 

Melchizedek, 88. 

Menephthah, 281, 292. 

Midianites, 469. 

Miracles, remarks respecting them, 
305. 

Miriam, 256, 326, 400. Her death, 
440. 

Mnevis, the calf-god, 190, 205, 246. 

Moab, 447. 

Money, Egyptian, 79. 

Monuments, Egyptian, 246. 

Moriah, 109. 

Moses born, 256. As an Egyptian 
priest, 266, 283. Flies to Arabia, 
271. Takes a wife, 275. Called to 
deliver his people, 287. Before 
Pharaoh, 292. Doomed, 436. Sur- 
renders the leadership to Joshua, 
483. His blessing and hymn, 483. 
His end, 484. 

Mugeyer, 50. 

Mukatteb, " written valley," 276, 343. 

Murrain, plague of, 300. 

Musa, Jebel, 362. 

Mutiny in the Israelite camp, 411. 



Kadab consumed, 387. 

Nebo, Mount, 484. 

Neph, the god, 202, 

Nile, 208. Its overflowing, how 

caused, 208. 
Numbers of Israelites in the Exodus, 

313. Afterward, 393, 446. 

Og, king of Bashan, 459. His size, 

464. 
On, city of, 203. 



Orfa, 55. 

Osiris, the god, 189. 

Osirides, statutes of Osiris, 191. 



Padan-Aram, where, 61. 

Palestine, origin of name, 77. 

Paran, wilderness of, 401. 

Papyrus, 119* 

Passover, feast instituted, 311. 

Peninsula of Sinai, 275. 

Pentecost, feast of, 392. 

Peor, Mount, 474. 

Pharaoh, meaning of the name, 185. 

Pharaoh's dreams, 196. 

Pharaohof the Exodus, 284. Drowned 

in the Red Sea, 325. 
Phoenician alphabet, 120. 
Pillar of cloud and of fire, 315. 
Pisgah, Mount, 473, 479. 
Plagues on Egypt sent, 298, etc. 
Primogeniture, its rights, 140. 
Ptolemy, in hieroglyphics, 117. 



Quails sent, 339, 398. 



Rachel, 158, etc. Her death, 176. 
Rahah, Jebel, 329, 402. 
Rahah, plain, 361. * 
Ramesses IL, 263, 267. 
Rebekah, 130. 

Rebellion of Korah, etc., 422. 
Red Sea crossed, 324. Place of cross- 
ing, 327. 
Religion of the Chaldeans, 52. 
Religion of the Egyptians, 188. 
Rephidim, 352. 

Ritter, Carl, his testimony, 462. 
Rock-houses of Bashan, 452, etc. 



Sabbath, first instituted, 341. 

Sarai's jealousy, 91, 98. 

Sarah, name given, 94. Her death, 
112. 

Serbal, Mount, 345. Its claims as Si- 
nai, 346. 

Serpents, fiery, 443. 

Sethos I., 252. 

Shechem, prince of, slain, 174. 

Sheikh, Wady, 361. 

Shemitic family, 65. 

Shepherd-kings in Egypt, 74. 

Shittim wood, 379. 

Shittim, plain of, 467. 

Sidon, sarcophagus, 122. 

Sichem (Shechem), 65, 173. 

Sihon, king, 449. 



496 



INDEX, 



Sinai, 357. 

Sinew shrunk, 172. 

Sodom destroyed, 95. 

Sooksafe, Jebel, 363. 

Spies sent out, 405. Their report, 

410. 
Spirit of God, Egyptian deity, 189, 

202. 
Strabo, concerning Moses, 283. 
Succoth, 173, 315. 
Sufah, es-, 416. 
Sulphur at southern end of Dead Sea, 

83. 



Tabernacle, 381. 

Tabernacles, feast of, 392. 

Taylor, Mr., his explorations, 51. 

Tent life, why unchangeable, 27. 

Terah, 58. 

Teraphim, 163. 

Theocracy, the Jewish system, 389. 

Thummim, 385. 

Thunder at Sinai, 367. 



Timbrel, 326. 
Tuthmosis III., 199. 



Ur, a sacred region, 63. 
Urim, 385. 
Ur-uck, king, 51. 



Vale of Siddim, 84. 



Wady, meaning of the word, 19. 
Warburton's ''Divine Legation of 

Moses," 390. 
"Weibeh, fountain, 406. 
Well, Jacob's, 173. 
Wilderness of Paran, 401. 
Women among the Arabs, 35, 42. 



Zered, brook, 447. 

Zipporah, wife of Moses, 275, 399. 



LIFE-SCENES 



FROM THE 



FOUR GOSPELS. 

By Kev. GEORGE JONES, M.A., 

Chaplain United States Navy, 

WITH MAPS AND TWEITTY-FIVE ILLUSTRATIVE ENGEAVINGS. 
Large 13xno. ^3.00. 



From The Methodist Home tTournal, Philadelphia. 

The richest treat we have had lately in the book line, is " Life-Scenes from the Four Gos- 
pels." Externally, the volume displays the genius and taste of the binder; typographically, 
it wins our love at first sight. As a book of Bible-scenes, however, its chief attractiveness 
and value must be determined. Chaplain Jones, the author, is a veteran in the service, 
having received his commission from the hands of President Jackson, and both on sea and 
land he has gathered a rich, ripe store of practical knowledge and personal experience, from 
which he gives a volume to the world that will greatly tend to familiarize men of this gen- 
eration with the actual in that life of lives— the history and teachings of Jesus. The facts 
and features of Jewish character and condition, sketches of localities for ever sacred, and 
narratives of life-scenes, fresh, beautiful and truthful, with which the book abounds, must 
commend it to popular esteem. What floods of light it brings to the student of the gospels I 
What help it may afford the Sabbath-school teacher in preparing for the lesson! What 
illustrations are here for the preacher ! We say to everybody our word may reach, Get this 
book. 

Frotn The Sundat/ -School Teacher, Chicago, 

Picture-teaching is always delightful, if at all well managed. It is the method for a Sun- 
day-school teacher. To give definite, clearly-conceived pictures to a class, is to give them 
that which they will remember. But more than half the battle is to get the picture clearly 
formed in the mind of the teacher, and to get the habit of making mental pictures. 

This large volume is a gallery of carefully-drawn pictures, illustrated with diagrams and 
cuts, representing the life of Christ. Read this book attentively, and it will do as much as 
any work we know to give the art of Pictorial Teaching. 

From The National JBaptist, Philadelphia, 

The purpose of the author to render the incidents of our Saviour's life as vivid as possi- 
ble, to reproduce the scenes so that the reader may live in them as a reality, and feel that 
he is among living beings, is a very laudable object. Whatever brings home to us the events 
described in the Bible, and causes them to seem natural, is a real contribution to the value 
of the Bible. 

Such is the design of this volume, and we are glad to see that the design has been well 
executed. The same process might have been carried further by the introduction of inci- 
dents and characters not contained in the sacred narrative, but that would have impaired 
the truthfulness of the account and reduced the whole nearly to the level of fiction. The 
author has confined himself to the events recorded, but has sought to invest them with new 
interests, describing each as nearly as possible just as it took place, making use of all the 
aid which is furnished by the best books in biblical archaeology, criticism, topography and 
history. 

From The Toadies' Mepositorj/, Cincinnati. 

This is a most valuable, interesting and instructive book. Its ol)ject is to give a fulness 
to the scenes in the Gospels, by interweaving with the Scripture narrative the various infor- 
mation which modern research has placed within our reach, and thus imparting to them a 
freshness and reality which they cannot have without this knowledge of the country, peo- 
ple and social customs in the midst of which the events happened. It is a graceful and 
captivating harmony of the Gospels; the life of Christ being presented as one continued 
narrative, and with true historic accuracy. The information incorporated into the story is 
of undoubted authority, and is just such as the Sabbath-school teacher and Christian needs 
to have, and we know of no other book in which so much can be found in so small compass 
and in so pleasant arrangement. 

42 - 497 



498 

From The American Presbyterian, JPhilndeTphia. 

The author of tliis work is a veteran Chaplain in the Navy, who has travelled in the Holy 
Land, and speaks with the authority and interest of a personal observer. His undertaking 
is one of the most laudable, as it is one of the most difficult in literature, and demands the 
joint labors of many gifted, pious and thoroughly informed minds before it can be regarded 
as accomplished. We welcome Chaplain Jones' book as a highly valuable contribution to 
this department. Its topographical and historical illustrations are important, and furnish 
positive additions to our knowledge; exhibiting as some of them do the comparative levels 
of different points on the surface of the Holy Land. 

From Tlie Reformed Church Messenger^ Philadelphia. 

We do not know when we have met with a work which has for us so much interest as 
this. The leading facts which form the basis of these historical sketches are so skilfully 
presented as to throw around them a freshness and charm which makes the perusal of them 
a delightful recreation, as well as a source of profitable instruction. The work is a valu- 
able one for all students of the Bible, and especially for pastors and Sunday-school teach- 
ers. The illustrations are numerous and well executed, and the whole w^ork is gotten out 
in the excellent style characteristic of the enterprising publishers. 

From The JHor^ning Star, Dover, 3r. S. 

The author has visited the Holy Land, has studied his subject through the works of all the 
eminent explorers, has made himself familiar with the topography, features and spirit of the 
countries which Christ traversed, has laid the results of biblical research and criticism under 
contribution, has ever kept an active imagination under the control of a sound and in- 
structed Christian judgment and has saturated his whole mental nature with the spirit of 
a loving and adoring disciple. The result is before us in this beautifully printed volume, 
whose interest is such that it will hold the attention of a sympathetic reader from the be- 
ginning to the end; it will render most essential aid in preparing Sabbath-school teachers 
for their work in the class, and even in enabling many a pastor to preach Christ with added 
clearness of vision and a more effective unction. Whoever buys the book will gain a real 
blessing; and no earnest study of its pages can fail to make the New Testament gain in in- 
terest and significance, and its great Personage stand out with fresh distinctness and higher 
glory. 

From Tlie Sunday -ScTwol Times, Philadelphia, 

Mr. Jones has travelled with acute observation as a Christian scholar in the Holy Land, 
and has with this advantage brought also to his task a diligent, painstaking research, when- 
ever it could throw light and reality on the pages of Scripture. 

Clear in style, without egotism and expansion, it has one exalted ambition. It seeks to 
make the reader realize the statements of the gospels as facts passing actually in review. 
This is not by a tame paraphrase of language, but the reader will soon discover a vast 
amount of learning, bringing from their hiding-place ancient customs and language, until 
the mind walks hand in hand a companion with antiquity, and the panorama of the Gospel 
keeps before the eye like a present reality. 

From, The CJiristian Times {Episcopal), New York, 

The author of this work was recommended by the late Professor Siiliman for his talents, 
culture and Christian attainments. He presents in this volume a successful attempt to fill 
up the scenes in the gospels, and render them still more life-like by the aid of his own in- 
vestigations while in Palestine, combined with all the help that is to be derived from the 
studies of others. This is no superficial or mere sketching effort, but one that has evidently 
cost the author much time and study, and which should bring its appropriate reward. The 
style is such as would naturally be expected from a ready writer, earnestly engaged in de- 
lineating scenes in the history of our Lord. 

Front Tlie Congregational ist, Boston, 

This is a very beautiful volume and deserves to be widely read. Its object is to help the 
reader to understand the Gospel lands and scenes, from illustrations furnished by modern 
research, and to present all freshly and vivaciously before the mind. The work is well done, 
the engravings and nuips are of a superior character, and the whole book is calculated at 
once to please and to instruct. 

From The Christian Secretary, Hartford, Conn, 

We are greatly interested in tliis book. It is an excellently printed duodecimo volume, 
including maps, pictorial illustrations and a satisfactory index. The author has pei-sonally 
visited the localities of the scenery ho describes, and the method of weaving together the 
Gospel narrative is really admirable. He has certainly accomplished his purpose of making 
the work Life-scenes from the four Gospels. It contains a great deal of information illus- 
trative of the N«'w Testament, and it will be found of high value to pastors, superintend- 
ents and Sttbbuth-Hchool tea( hers— indeed to all class of persons who aio interested in Bible 
knowledge and study. Must heartily do wo recommend it. 



I 



